Around a dozen nuns and several workers from the same convent have been released after being held for more than three months by rebels in Syria.<br /><br />The women were set free at the Lebanese border as part of a swap in which the Syrian government has agreed to release 138 women being held in Syrian jails.<br /><br />The nuns were seized from their convent in the Christian village of Maaloula when it was overrun by rebels including members of the al-Qaeda-linked Nusra Front.<br /><br />They had been working in the convent’s orphanage at the time.<br /><br />Although Syria’s Christians have tried to stay on the sidelines of the country’s three year-old-conflict their capture confirmed fears among the minority community that they had become targets for extremists within the rebels.
