Eight Chinese hostages kidnapped at the beginning of the January have been freed, Xinhua news agency confirmed Saturday, citing the Chinese embassy in Baghdad. The hostages were being handed over to an Islamic organization which had played a decisive role in negotiating their release, Iraq's Sawa radio had earlier reported. The kidnappers had called on the Chinese government to ban their citizens from traveling to Iraq. The foreign ministry in Beijing had emphasized Friday that it had repeatedly warned Chinese about undertaking such a journey. The eight abducted Chinese were workers from the southern Chinese province of Fujian.
