BBC NEWS Three Swedes freed from Ethiopia Three Swedish men have been released by Ethiopia after being detained for five months on suspicion of helping Islamist militants in Somalia. A spokeswoman for Sweden's foreign ministry said the three men, who were originally arrested in Somalia, were now back in Sweden. Spokeswoman Nina Ersman said the three had not been charged with any offence. Ethiopia has said it detained a number of people after its army helped drive Islamists out of Somalia's capital. Two of the men are Swedish nationals and one has permanent residency status in Sweden. Their names have not been released. Sweden's foreign ministry had been demanding the release of the detainees for several weeks. "I would like to express my gratitude to all foreign ministry officials who made this possible," Sweden's Foreign Minister Carl Bildt said in a statement. A lawyer for the three men said there had been no notification from Ethiopia that they would be released. Ethiopia's government said in April that it had detained 41 people from 17 countries after its army helped Somalia's transitional government drive militias allied to the Union of Islamic Courts out of Mogadishu at the end of last year. Some detainees were deported from Kenya, where many Somalis fled the fighting in Mogadishu. Ethiopia has defended the detentions as part of its efforts to combat international terrorism in the Horn of Africa. Human rights groups say US agents have been allowed to interrogate the detainees as part of the hunt for al-Qaeda suspects in the region. Story from BBC NEWS: http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/africa/6673117.stm Published: 2007/05/19 17:22:14 GMT C BBC MMVII . <http://geo.yahoo.com/serv?s=97359714/grpId=11648958/grpspId=1705447214/msgI d=33189/stime=1179674945/nc1=3848621/nc2=3848643/nc3=3848538> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] -------------------------- Want to discuss this topic? Head on over to our discussion list, [EMAIL PROTECTED] -------------------------- Brooks Isoldi, editor [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.intellnet.org Post message: osint@yahoogroups.com Subscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] *** FAIR USE NOTICE. This message contains copyrighted material whose use has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. OSINT, as a part of The Intelligence Network, is making it available without profit to OSINT YahooGroups members who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information in their efforts to advance the understanding of intelligence and law enforcement organizations, their activities, methods, techniques, human rights, civil liberties, social justice and other intelligence related issues, for non-profit research and educational purposes only. We believe that this constitutes a 'fair use' of the copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Law. If you wish to use this copyrighted material for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use,' you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/osint/ <*> Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional <*> To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/osint/join (Yahoo! ID required) <*> To change settings via email: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/