{"id":11724,"date":"2012-06-21T23:37:25","date_gmt":"2012-06-21T21:37:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/06\/update-2-south-african-couple-freed-by-somali-captors\/"},"modified":"2012-06-21T23:37:25","modified_gmt":"2012-06-21T21:37:25","slug":"update-2-south-african-couple-freed-by-somali-captors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/update-2-south-african-couple-freed-by-somali-captors\/","title":{"rendered":"UPDATE 2-South African couple freed by Somali captors"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>* Pair abducted by pirates, held for 20 months<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>* Release followed negotiation, unclear if ransom paid<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>* Couple left Somalia for Djibouti<\/p>\n<p> (Adds details, background)<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>MOGADISHU, June 21 (Reuters) &#8211; A South African couple<br \/>\nkidnapped by Somali pirates 20 months ago aboard a yacht in the<br \/>\nIndian Ocean have been freed and flew out of Somalia on<br \/>\nThursday.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Looking thin and stressed, one of the sailors, Bruno<br \/>\nPelizzari, told reporters the release followed a negotiated<br \/>\nsettlement. He did not say if a ransom had been paid.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Today we are happy to get our freedom back,&#8221; Pelizzari said<br \/>\nat the presidential palace complex in the Somali capital<br \/>\nMogadishu.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Pelizzari and his companion Debbie Calitz later left the<br \/>\nHorn of Africa nation for Djibouti, two sources in the Somali<br \/>\nprime minister&#8217;s office said.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The South African government thanked the Somali government<br \/>\nand Italy for their roles in securing the release of the couple.<br \/>\nIt did not give any details about the roles played.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Armed pirates hijacked the yacht Choizil in October 2010 as<br \/>\nit was about to enter the Mozambique channel south of the<br \/>\nTanzanian port city of Dar es Salaam.<br \/>\n\u00a0 <span class=\"label\"><strong>Continued&#8230;<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>* Pair abducted by pirates, held for 20 months * Release followed negotiation, unclear if ransom paid * Couple left Somalia for Djibouti (Adds details, background) MOGADISHU, June 21 (Reuters) &#8211; A South African couple kidnapped by Somali pirates 20 months ago aboard a yacht in the Indian Ocean have been freed and flew out [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[830,2370,183],"class_list":{"0":"post-11724","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-news","8":"tag-reuters","9":"tag-south-africa-2","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11724","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11724"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11724\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11724"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11724"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11724"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}