2 foreign journalists released

MOGADISHU, Somalia: Two foreign journalists - a Briton and a Spaniard - were released Sunday after nearly six weeks in captivity in Somalia, a regional official said.

Colin Freeman, a British correspondent for the Sunday Telegraph, and a freelance photographer, José Cendón of Spain, were seized in November as they left a hotel in the town.

The semiautonomous region of Puntland in northern Somalia has become notorious for kidnappings and piracy. The journalists were working on a piracy story when they were kidnapped in November.

"The journalists were released and all details will be given to the media once we hold a press conference in the coming hours," said Muse Gelle Yusuf, a governor in Puntland.

Foreigners, journalists and humanitarian workers are frequently abducted for ransoms in the chaotic and violent Horn of Africa nation.

In August, two freelance journalists, an Australian and a Canadian, were kidnapped near the capital, Mogadishu. They are still being held.

For two decades, Somalia has been beset by anarchy, violence and an insurgency that has killed thousands of civilians and sent hundreds of thousands fleeing from mortar shells, machine-gun crossfire and grenades.

The United Nations says Somalia has 300,000 acutely malnourished children, but attacks and kidnappings of aid workers have shut down many humanitarian projects.

The anarchy has also allowed Somali pirates to flourish, attacking 111 ships around the Gulf of Aden in 2008, hijacking 42 of them and earning tens of millions in ransom. Fifteen ships with more than 260 crew are still in the hands of pirates, according to the International Maritime Bureau.