Published time: March 08, 2013 04:15
The Syrian rebels who captured a group of Philippine UN peacekeepers are now willing to release them and want the Red Cross to escort them out of the area, the Philippine military said on Friday.
It comes after the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights released a video showing some of the 21 peacekeepers, with one man – who identified himself as a captain in the UN Philippine battalion – saying that he and his men are in “a safe place.”
The UN observers were seized by Syrian rebels in Golan Heights. Initially the rebels said the peacekeepers would not be released until Syrian government forces withdrew from the village of Jamlah, but then seemed to have played down their demands, calling the hostages “guests” and stressing that they would not harm them.
“They want the ICRC to pick them up and escort them,” Philippine military spokesman Col. Arnulfo Marcelo Burgos said. “Hopefully they will really be released and we are also waiting for that.”
The UN and the Philippine government had condemned the capture of the peacekeepers and urged the insurgents to immediately release them. Russia’s UN envoy Vitaly Churkin said the seizure of the UN observers showed “gross disrespect for the United Nations.”
