'No Ransom Paid' as Abducted Palestinian Businessman Released

A Palestinian businessman, who was kidnapped in the northern Akkar province on Monday, has been released, the state-run National News Agency reported.

Armed men kidnapped trader Youssef Loubani in the Akkar plains. But NNA said he was released at 2:00 am Tuesday and returned to his house in the Palestinian refugee camp of Nahr al-Bared.

While the agency said the circumstances of his release were not clear, Voice of Lebanon radio (93.3) quoted his relatives as saying that no ransom was paid for setting the 50-year-old free.

NNA said on Monday that Loubani's family had filed a complaint with concerned authorities, explaining that they received a phone call from a number with the 08 area code of the eastern Bekaa valley demanding a ransom.

Loubani, a former sewer, is father to 22 children from two different wives, one of whom is deceased. Several of his kids live in the United States.