Kurds release tourist kidnapped in Turkey

A British tourist who was kidnapped by Kurdish rebels in southeastern Turkey at the weekend was freed on Monday, a local official told AFP. The 35-year-old was described as being in good health and is to be taken to the main southeastern city of Diyarbakir for questioning about his ordeal, the official said on condition of anonymity. The Briton, whose identity has not been disclosed, was snatched on Saturday by members of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) who had stopped the bus he was travelling on between Trabzon in northeastern Turkey to Diyarbakir. In a separate incident on Monday, a Turkish soldier was killed in the Diyarbakir region when a landmine laid by rebels exploded, a local security source said. Saturday's abduction comes amid an upsurge in activity by the rebel group, which last month kidnapped 10 people from a village in the Kurd-dominated southeast. The motive was unknown. The outlawed PKK, listed as a terrorist organisation by Turkey and much of the international community, took up arms in Kurdish-majority southeastern Turkey in 1984, sparking a conflict that has claimed some 45,000 lives.e text