Somali pirates freed British hostage Judith Tebbutt today, more than six months after gunmen killed her husband and kidnapped her from a luxury beach resort in neighbouring Kenya.
"After efforts today, we have succeeded in the release of the British woman. She just left from Adado airport to Nairobi," a regional administration official, said from Adado in central Somalia.
Two witnesses said they saw Ms Tebbutt boarding an airplane that took off from Adado airport.
A pirate who identified himself as Ahmed said Ms Tebbutt had been handed over to regional administration officials early today after receiving a ransom that had been air dropped.
The British foreign office has used social networking site Twitter to repost messages from the British High Commission in Kenya about Mrs Tebbutt's release.
The first said: "We can confirm that Judith Tebbutt, the British hostage held in Somalia since September 2011, has been released." That was followed by a second message: "Our priority now is to get her to a place of safety. We will have more to say shortly."
Gunmen raided the remote Kiwayu Safari village in the early hours of September 11th, shooting dead publishing executive David Tebbutt (58) and taking his wife hostage before escaping by boat to nearby Somalia.
In the following weeks, attackers abducted a disabled French lady from another beach in northern Kenya and two Spanish aid workers from a refugee camp in the east African country.
The Kenyan government blamed Somalia's al-Qaeda-linked militant group al Shabaab and sent hundred of troops across the border, scrambling to beef up security along the porous frontier and reassure a spooked tourism sector.
Al Shabaab denied they were behind the wave of kidnappings and pirates, who usually focus on hijacking merchant ships and private yachts off the lawless country's coast, said they were holding Ms Tebbutt.
Reuters