German Police Free Prison Hostages

Police special forces overpowered two inmates at a prison in the eastern German city of Naumburg and freed the two workers they had taken hostage, officials said on Monday. No one was injured in the operation which took place shortly before midnight on Sunday, said prosecutor general Hans-Jürgen Neufang, who commanded the police operation. The two inmates, identified only as German males aged 37 and 44 serving multi-year sentences for violent crimes, seized the prison employees on Sunday afternoon and demanded they be freed from jail in exchange for the hostages, a man and a woman. Police said the prisoners did not have firearms, and were threatening the hostages with a pair of scissors. The two inmates had initially taken a third person hostage, but the man managed to escape, a police spokeswoman said.