British journalist Sean Langan has been released after being abducted and held in Afghanistan for three months by a group associated with the Taliban, the Press Associaiton (PA) has reported. The freelance reporter was working for the Channel 4 programme Dispatches when he was abducted on the border of Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Some details:
A spokesman for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office confirmed that Mr Langan was "safe and well" after his release on Saturday night.
Mr Langan's family, who live in London, said he arrived back in the UK last night. "We are absolutely thrilled that Sean is back in the UK and free. "We can't thank Channel 4 enough for helping us. We have negotiated with his kidnappers for the last couple of weeks. Before that we were unaware of his kidnapping. He is as well as can be expected given his ordeal. We have no other comment to make apart from we are delighted."
Langan has worked on three previous films for Channel 4. Dispatches - Fighting the Taliban, produced by October Films, was nominated for a Bafta in the 2007 current affairs category. Others included Dispatches - Meeting the Taliban and Travels with a Gringo - Langan in Latin America.
He has also worked for the BBC. His credits include Afghan Ladies' Driving School, Mission Accomplished: Langan in Iraq, Langan in Zimbabwe and Langan Behind the Lines. For the 1998 film three part series Nightmare in Paradise for BBC2, he searched for four Western tourists kidnapped in Kashmir by members of an Islamic militant group later aligned to al Qaida.
