British tourists released in Egypt

Two British tourists who were kidnapped in southern Sinai have been freed just hours after their kidnapping, local officials say.

The British couple is safe and in a security building in Ras Sidr in southern Sinai, an Egyptian military intelligence official told Reuters.

The couple were freed after police promised their captors they would release a detained relative who had been arrested and accused of smuggling weapons from Libya to Egypt, he added.

Tourists have been targeted in the past by Bedouin in Sinai wanting to pressure police to free detained relatives.