Libya: hostages freed from IS as airstrikes kill civilians

Three North Koreans kidnapped by Islamic State [IS] near the city of Sirte have been freed, according to a Libyan official.

Muftah Salem, a Health Ministry official in the eastern town of Jalu, told The Associated Press on Tuesday that the North Korean couple and their driver were kidnapped outside the central city of Sirte more than a year ago.

They had been heading to Tripoli after finishing a five-year contract at Jalu's hospital.

Salem says IS militants offered to release them for $30 million ransom but the embassy in Tripoli refused.

He says they were freed earlier this month by Libyan forces who are battling to drive an IS affiliate out of Sirte, the extremist group's last stronghold in the North African country.

On Tuesday as well, at least eight civilians including women and children were killed in an airstrike near an oasis town in central Libya, a hospital doctor and an eyewitness told Reuters.

The identity of the war planes that carried out the strike near Houn could not be confirmed. Armed groups loyal to factions based in eastern and western Libya operate in the area.

At least 20 people were wounded in the strike and all victims were brought to the hospital in Houn, a doctor there said.

Reuters quoted an eyewitness as saying residents had heard warplanes overhead before learning that civilians had been hit. He went to the hospital to try to offer help and described the situation there as “chaotic.”