Greek bus hijackers surrender

A Greek bus hostage siege ended in the early hours of this morning when all 23 passengers were safely freed and two Albanian gunmen who had demanded a $1 million ransom surrendered, a police spokesman said.

The last six hostages held by the hijackers filed from the bus in an Athens suburb followed by police entering the vehicle and arresting the two hijackers.

"All the hostages have been freed safely and the two hijackers have surrendered," the spokesman told Reuters.

The drama started at about 6 a.m. (0800 GMT) yesterday and ended at about 12.45 a.m. today (2245 GMT yesterday).

The gunmen, identified by police as Albanians, had demanded a $1 million ransom and a flight to Russia. They had threatend to blow up the bus with dynamite if their demands were not met.

They were also armed with hunting rifles.

Negotiators had spoken with the gunmen throughout the day convincing them to release hostages in twos or threes until only six were still left on the bus.

At that stage, the gunmen set a deadline of 8 a.m. (0600 GMT) today for their demands to be met and vowed not to release any more hostages.

But about four hours after setting the deadline, the bus doors suddenly opened without warning and the remaining captors walked to freedom.

Seconds later the gunmen also got off the bus with their hands behind their heads and were immediately surrounded by police and arrested.

The successful end to the drama in which shots were fired when the vehicle was taken over on a road that was used as the route for last August's Athens Olympic Games was a stunning victory for the training security forces received during the Games.

"Apart from the discomfort of the long hours the hostages endured on the bus, no one was injured," a police official told Reuters.

Hundreds of helmeted police officers, snipers in camouflage fatigues and special forces were in position around the blocked blue bus, parked about 10 km east of Athens' centre during the siege.

Dozens of hostages' relatives were at the scene for the end of the drama.

The driver of the bus, a ticket collector and a woman passenger managed to escape from the bus in the first seconds of the hijack when shots were fired during the takeover. Police believe the driver's presence of mind in jumping from the bus with its keys before the hijackers could stop him headed off what could have been an even more serious situation.

His action, learned from training he received as an Olympic Games driver, ensured the bus was immobilised allowing police to throw a cordon around it.

About one million of Greece's 11 million population are Albanian immigrants or of recent Albanian descent - Greece's biggest minority group. Many came from the neighbouring nation to help with building work for the Athens Olympics.

Two hijackings by Albanians in 1999 ended with the two hostage-takers being killed by police.

Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis had postponed his departure for a European Union summit in Brussels by one day until today to deal with the crisis.