US aid group says eight staffers freed
JUBA, South Sudan (AP) — The U.S.-based aid group World Vision says eight local staffers and a Ugandan who were abducted earlier this week in civil war-torn South Sudan have been released.
They were seized on Monday while driving in a convoy outside the Equatorian town of Yambio.
The statement on Friday says the United Nations and local authorities led negotiations for their release.
Neither South Sudan’s government nor opposition has taken responsibility for the abduction. Each often blames the other in such circumstances.
This is the third abduction of humanitarian workers in two months in South Sudan. Seventeen aid workers were kidnapped by armed groups in two separate incidents last month.
The release comes as a new round of peace talks on the conflict is underway in neighboring Ethiopia.
8 jailed on foiled attack on team
PRISTINA, Kosovo (AP) — A Kosovo court has sentenced nine Albanians, eight to jail, for planning a foiled attack against the Israeli soccer team during a 2016 qualifying World Cup match in neighboring Albania.
Pristina court Judge Hamdi Ibrahimi on Friday sentenced the leader of the group, Visar Ibishi, to 10 years in jail. Seven others got between a year-and-a-half in prison to 6 years. One was slapped with a $2,950 fine.
“There is no place for extremism on this land,” the judge said. “Such defendants’ acts have aimed to create both in Kosovo and Albania a climate of uncertainty, let the extremist elements get in and destabilize the country with terror acts.”
The planned attack in November 2016 was said to have been coordinated by two Albanians in Syria fighting with the Islamic State group. Kosovo authorities say about 180 citizens are still active with extremist groups in Syria and Iraq.
Both Kosovo and Albanian authorities claim that no more of their citizens have joined the rebel groups in Syria and Iraq over the past couple of years.
