Jubilant Fijians are celebrating the release of 45 UN peacekeepers from the South Pacific nation who were kidnapped by al-Qaeda linked rebels on the Golan Heights, hailing them as heroes after their two-week ordeal.
Fijian leader Voreqe Bainimarama said the prayers of the deeply religious South Pacific nation had been answered with confirmation that fighters from the Al-Nusra Front had released the Blue Helmets unharmed.
"I know all Fijians join me in feeling a great sense of relief and joy," he told an early morning press conference to welcome the news, which broke in the middle of the night in the Pacific.
The nation of 900,000, which has a long history of involvement in UN peacekeeping missions, had been on tenterhooks about the fate of the troops, who were taken prisoner on August 28.
Some Fijians took to the Fiji information ministry's Facebook page to celebrate the news of the release.
"Fiji prayed and God answered. We are coming home," Ahmad Khan said, while Leanne Brummell joked the men "will have some stories" to tell when drinking kava, a local root beverage.
The peacekeepers were part of the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF), which monitors a 1974 ceasefire agreement between Israel and Syria on the Golan.
They were forced to surrender their weapons and taken hostage when the Al-Nusra militants seized control of the Quneitra crossing following a battle with troops loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
A second group of peacekeepers - 81 Filipinos - was surrounded by the rebels, but held their ground, refused to lay down their weapons and later managed to escape.
The Fijians were released at 2:30pm local time on Thursday and taken for medical checks.
Bainimarama, himself a former UN peacekeeper, said they were "healthy and in high spirits" and determined to continue their mission in the Middle East.
"These 45 men are heroes," he told reporters. "They kept their cool and showed restraint under the most extreme circumstances imaginable.
"Because of their discipline, not one militant was killed and none of our soldiers were harmed."
A UN spokesman said the abductors had made no demands to secure their release, "and there were no concessions".
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon welcomed the release of the peacekeepers, with a spokesman saying he appreciated "the efforts of all concerned to secure their safe release".
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