3 American Tourists, Kidnaped by Kurds, Released in Turkey

WASHINGTON —  Three American tourists kidnaped by Kurdish rebels in Turkey have been released, their families and the State Department said Friday night.

Word of the release came from the U.S. Embassy in Ankara, department spokeswoman Sondra McCarty said. Details were not immediately available.

The tourists were identified as Ronald Wyatt, 57, of Nashville, Tenn.; Marvin T. Wilson of Garland, Tex., and Richard M. Rives, said to be from North Carolina.

The State Department said it believes two other men taken in the same Aug. 30 incident--Allen Roberts of Australia and Gareth Thomas of Britain--also were released. But there was no official report of their whereabouts.

Wilson’s wife, Renatta, said her husband called her shortly after 6 p.m. Friday. “He sounded wonderful,” she said. Her husband said the former captives were being protected by Turkish soldiers.

Gunmen from the Kurdish Labor Party, or PKK, reportedly stopped a minibus carrying the five in Bingol province. PKK, which wants a Kurdish state in southeastern Turkey, has said tourists should get travel permits for the region from its offices in Europe.

Since 1977, Wyatt has been conducting a search for the site of Noah’s Ark, which the Bible says made a landfall in eastern Turkey near Mt. Ararat after the flood.