Special flight will carry nurses stranded in Iraq from Erbil to Kochi, expected to reach Saturday morning: Sources — ANI (@ANI_news) July 4, 2014

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM/DELHI: All 46 Indian nurses held captive by Sunni insurgents in Iraq have been freed and will return to India on Saturday, according to reports.The nurses are with Indian officials and are being taken to Erbil airport, from where they will return to Kerala on a special flight.Kerala chief minister Oommen Chandy also confirmed that the nurses are on their way back home.Chandy told IANS over telephone from New Delhi that an Air India flight will depart from the Indian capital Friday evening to Erbil, the capital of Kurdistan."There will be one official each from the Kerala and central governments on the plane," he said. "The nurses will board the flight at Erbil and the plane will reach Kochi at 7am tomorrow."Chandy had earlier said that the nurses, all from Kerala, were set to be freed by the insurgents.The 46 nurses were put in a bus from Tikrit on Thursday afternoon in the company of armed militants and driven to Mosul, where they reached late at night.On Friday morning, they were given food and allowed to speak over the telephone to their families in Kerala.(With inputs from IANS)