AN OPEN letter appealing for the people of Jammu-Kashmir to help free hostage Paul Wells was being distributed throughout the region today.

Thirty thousand copies of the Urdu-translated plea, signed by the families of the four Western captives, was being taken to mosques in time for Friday prayers.

Paul's mother, Mrs Dianne Wells, of Bracken Close, Feniscowles, Blackburn, said it was an appeal to the people of Kashmir, rather than the Al-Faran captors.

She added: "It explains that the hostage taking is not doing their cause any good."

Paul, 25, Middlesbrough man Keith Mangan, German Dirk Hasert and American Donald Hutchings have been held for 284 days by the Kashmiri separatist guerillas.

The group want rebel colleagues released from Indian jails in return for the hostages.

The campaign, arranged by the families with the aid of the Foreign Office, has been timed to coincide with the end of the harsh winter.

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