欧洲军事观察员及乌克兰助理被释放
欧洲军事观察员7人以及他们的5个乌克兰助理已经被全部释放。
All seven European military observers have been released in eastern Ukraine. Five of their Ukrainian assistants have also been released. They had been held for more than a week in an anti-government militia stronghold.
One of the freed OSCE observers, Axel Schneider, speaks to reporters in the
southern Ukrainian city of Slavyansk on May 3, 2014.
Standing outside the occupied city hall in Slavyansk just moments after their release. All seven of the European military observers who were sized at a checkpoint on the edge of the city are now free. The self proclaimed Mayor of Slavyansk, who has repeatedly called them his guests rather that hostages, described their detention as a misunderstanding.
"So I repeat… those are not hostages, they are guests. When we looked closely at the situation that happened, we came to the mutual conclusion that the officers from the European countries. They appeared to be hostages of the circumstance." Self-Declared Mayor Of Slavyansk Vyacheslav Ponomaryov said.
Russian President Vladimir Putin sent an envoy to southeast Ukraine to negotiate the release of European military observers and despite earlier suggestions that the eastern militia were seeking a prisoner exchange, the Russian envoy said no deal had been done.
"The release was with no conditions attached. But we hope, and we want very much, that after this humanitarian act, other humanitarian acts will follow. First of which is the stoppage of armed clashes and for both sides to come to the negotiation table to solve this difficult situation.” Russian envoy Vladimir Lukin said.
Hugging the man who detained him, the German officer who led the observer mission clearly happy to be heading home.
As the European observers leave Slavyansk, with the five members of the Ukrainian military who were accompanying the mission, the Ukrainian hostage crisis comes to an end.
They’ve spent 8 nights in captivity but on Saturday morning all of the European hostages and the Ukrainians that were travelling with them when they were seized were finally released.
