Britons released in Gaza safe after 'shameful' kidnap
(AFP)
Updated: 2005-12-31 10:08

Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat confirmed that three Britons kidnapped in the Gaza Strip had been released and were safe, branding their abduction "shameful" and damaging to Palestinian interests.

"Some of my people there confirmed to me that they are now on their way to Gaza (City). They haven't reached Gaza," he told BBC television by telephone.

"I'm happy that this despicable, shameful act is over. These people are friends and I hope that this will be the last (such event).

"They are safe and well," he added.

"We have some people from the British consulate in Gaza, they will be handed to them and I am sure that they will take them to Jerusalem."

Humanitarian aid worker Kate Burton, 24, and her parents Hugh and Helen were released late Friday after a two-day ordeal, Palestinian MP Kamal al-Sharafi told AFP in Gaza earlier.

The trio were abducted at gunpoint on Wednesday close to the Rafah border crossing into Egypt from the southern Gaza Strip.

British aid worker Kate Burton, 25, right, covers her face with an Arab head scarf as she sites next to her father Hugh after crossing from the Gaza Strip into Israel at the Israeli side of the Erez crossing l early Saturday Dec. 31, 2005. [AP]

Asked who was holding them, Erakat said: "I don't know anything about it. I was talking to the chief of police and I really urged that these people be brought to justice immediately.

"I hope that this will be the last of such despicable acts that really harms us as Palestinians and destroys our interests."

Erakat said the Palestinian authorities had exerted "every possible human effort" to find the abducted Britons and was "very happy" they were now in safe hands.

"There were house-to-house searches, area-to-area searches, town-to-town searches," he said.

"All I was caring about is that these people are safe and sound and they are on the way to Gaza."

He said he did not think a deal had been done to secure their release.

Challenged that the Gaza Strip was descending into lawlessness ahead of important elections, amid a spate of kidnappings, Erakat said: "I cannot disagree with you."

The United States, Russia, the European Union and the United Nations, authors of the "roadmap" for Middle East peace, have pressured Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas to end attacks on Israel by armed groups opposed to the peace process.

Those groups, like Islamic Jihad or Hamas, could make a strong showing in the Palestinian legislative council elections on January 25.

Abbas's Fatah-dominated Palestinian Authority has also proved largely incapable of clamping down on pervasive insecurity in the Palestinian territories.

Erakat said: "We have a very difficult situation in Gaza. I hope this will be the labour pains before these elections," which he hoped would ease the situation.

"Everything is being done now to try and restore some law and order at this stage in order to ensure the free and fair elections we are hoping for.

"We don't have enough capacity in Gaza. We hope to restore law and order by providing for our security forces everything they need, to rebuild our communication centres, command centres, training centres.

"I wish I can promise that we can end this lawlessness and chaos; but we are determined to excert maximum effort in this direction."