Ethnic Albanian gunmen in Macedonia have released five people held since Thursday in a tense standoff with the authorities.

They are alive and in good condition

Interior Ministry Spokesman Vojislav Zafirovski

The hostages are reported to have emerged unscathed from their detention by former members of the National Liberation Army (NLA), an ethnic-Albanian guerrilla group involved in an insurrection last year.

The gunmen themselves managed to escape from the village of Zerovjane, said government spokesman Vojislav Zafirovski.

Security forces had been sent in to surround the village in north-western Macedonia, and they shot dead a man at a checkpoint on Friday, though it is unknown whether that incident was linked to the hostage-taking.

Death threats

The armed kidnappers abducted seven people from a bus late on Thursday and threatened to kill them if fellow former militants suspected of murdering two policemen were not freed.

Two hostages were subsequently released and the remaining five - including senior state officials - were set free at about 0330 local time (0130 GMT), authorities said.

Interior Minister Ljube Boskovski, right, had threatened police action

Two armoured cars, belonging to the European Union monitoring mission in Macedonia, drove into Zerovjane and then took the group to the capital, Skopje.

Spokesman Vojislav Zafirovski said: "The hostages have been released.

"They are alive and in good condition."

Ambassadors from the European Union, Nato, the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe and the United States had been involved in talks about the hostages with ethnic Albanian politicians in the Macedonian city of Tetovo.

Interior Minister Ljube Boskovski had warned that action would be taken if there was no progress with the negotiations.

Deadline

The kidnappers had reportedly said they would kill their prisoners unless their demands were met by a 1000 local time (0800 GMT) on Friday, a senior police source in Tetovo said.

But the deadline passed without any action being taken against the hostages.

One of the gunmen told the BBC that they had no plans to kill the hostages, as previous reports had suggested.

As well as wanting the release of their colleagues accused of murdering the policemen, the gunmen also accused the government of breaching a peace agreement reached last year.

The deal gave guerrilla fighters amnesty for their part in the war against the government and agreed the disbandment of the National Liberation Army (NLA).

Poll 'provocation'

The latest flare-up between the two sides came just two weeks before parliamentary elections in Macedonia which are seen as a key part of the peace, brokered in part by Nato.

President Boris Trajkovski said that the hostage-takers were clearly trying to disrupt the elections, set for September 15.

That view was echoed by the Nato Secretary General, Lord Robertson, who described the abductions as "deplorable and provocative".

Nato still has about 700 troops patrolling in Macedonia to help to ensure the implementation of the peace deal, which offered ethnic Albanians more political rights in return for them laying down their weapons.