FREED French journalist Florence Aubenas, looking thinner but radiant after five months as a captive in Iraq, arrived home to a joyful welcome last night and told of being held in a cellar, tied, blindfolded and given little water.

French envoys are to hold crisis talks in Iraq and Jordan today in a desperate bid to free two journalists seized by militants seeking to overturn France’s law banning Islamic head scarves in public schools.

France and Iraq have restored diplomatic relations that were severed 13 years ago during the Gulf War, the French Foreign Ministry said in Paris.