Unidentified gunmen raided the remote Kiwayu Safari Village in the early hours of last Sunday, shooting dead publishing executive David Tebbutt, 58, and taking hostage his wife Judith, 56, before escaping by boat.
"My colleagues brought her. I am among the ones guarding her ... Although you can understand the fatigue from her face, she is healthy," pirate Mohamed, one of the gang guarding the Briton, told Reuters.
An elder in central Somalia confirmed the Briton`s arrival.
"A convoy of pirates reached here two hours ago, they brought the British lady. We are very disappointed, we do not want our area to be a place for keeping kidnapped innocent people," local elder Abdullahi Ali Abukar told Reuters on Sunday.
Kidnapping has chiefly been carried out by Somali pirates in the Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean but Somali gunmen have attacked Westerners just across the border with Kenya on several occasions.
Three aid workers were kidnapped in July 2009, and two western nuns in November 2008.
Somalia`s al Qaeda-linked al Shabaab rebel group has said it was not behind the kidnapping and Britain has said it was working hard to secure her release.
The south of Somalia bordering Kenya is mainly controlled by al Shabaab, who have been fighting the Western-backed government in the capital Mogadishu for more than four years.
The lawless country has been without an effective central government since the dictator Siad Barre was toppled in 1991, after which first warlords then Islamist insurgents stepped into the power vacuum. (*)
Editor: Kunto Wibisono
Copyright © ANTARA 2011
