Jakarta - After 140 days of "living hell", four European hostages freed by Muslim gunmen in the southern Philippines left here early this morning for Libya, en route home.
The quartet - a Frenchman, German and two Finns - were accompanied by medical personnel and diplomats from their countries as well as Libyan mediator Mr Rajab Azzarouq, Tripoli's point man in negotiations which gained the hostages' freedom from the Abu Sayyaf guerrillas.
But the Philippines' worst-ever hostage crisis, on the remote, jungle island of Jolo, is still far from over. Leaders of the Abu Sayyaf guerrillas said there was no timetable for the release of their four remaining hostages.
