US reporter held captive in Syria freed after shootout

The chief foreign correspondent of US TV network NBC, Richard Engel, and members of his production crew have been freed in Syria after being held captive for five days.

NBC said their release came after a firefight at a rebel-held checkpoint on Monday, and that they were now "safely out of the country".

Mr Engel spoke to journalists as he arrived in Turkey, and later said their captors had talked "openly about their loyalty to the government" of President Bashar al-Assad.