TEHRAN (AFP) — A Belgian tourist freed after being held for more than a month by bandits in southeast Iran was reunited on Saturday in Tehran with his family as diplomats from both countries hailed his release.
Stefaan Boeve, 28, appeared at a press conference with his parents, Godelieve Vanderpoorten et Daniel Boeve, and Iranian Foreign Minister Manuchehr Mottaki and his Belgian counterpart Karel De Gucht.
Boeve was released "two days ago thanks to comprehensive action, part of which was intensive negotiation," said Mottaki, adding: "But as you know the police and security organs never tell us about their procedures."
A deputy Belgian foreign minister, whom he did not name, travelled three times to Iran, he said, adding that Iran's interior ministry had been assisted by Belgian intelligence agents.
"There was great transparency on what the Iranian authorities were doing, we had exchanges of information, some of it secret," said De Gucht. "We learnt how to work with one another."
Drug traffickers had seized the tourist and his travelling companion Carla Van den Eeckhout, 37, in the notoriously dangerous Sistan-Baluchestan province in southeast Iran on August 12.
Van den Eeckhout was released two days later.
Boeve, who made no comments at the press conference, and his parents are expected to return to Brussels late on Sunday together with the Belgian foreign minister.
De Gucht confirmed that Belgium would contribute half a million euros (692,550 dollars) to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, although he has stressed this was not a payoff for the release.
The donation was to thank Iran for its role in fighting drug trafficking, he said.
"We did not directly negotiate" with the suspected kidnappers, De Gucht said on Friday, although the abductors had contacted the victim's family eight times.
Belgian Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt has welcomed Boeve's release and thanked the Iranian authorities for their help.
In August, Belgian officials had said that Van den Eeckhout was released unharmed "for humanitarian reasons," adding that she had not been ill-treated.
The Belgians were abducted while driving on a road known for attacks by armed criminals and drug traffickers.
The road links the city of Bam in Kerman province with Zahedan, capital of the poverty-stricken Sistan-Baluchestan region heading to the Pakistani border.
According to the police commander in Bam, the Belgians were kidnapped by the head of a bandit group who offered their release in exchange for his jailed brother's freedom.
Despite warnings of steer clear, foreign tourists are still known to use the road to cross from Iran into Pakistan, despite at least six cases of foreigners having been kidnapped in the area since 1999.
Most of the cases have been resolved peacefully, although a German was killed in February 1999.
The region was also the scene of the kidnapping of 21 Iranians in August, who were abducted by bandits and taken across the border to Pakistan where they were later released by troops.
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