A GROUP OF western journalists are believed to have been captured in eastern Libya, and are being held in government detention camps.

USA Today and The Atlantic say that a freelance reporter working for them in region, Clare Morgana Gillis, is being held with two or maybe three others at a detention centre in Tripoli.

US citizen Gillis has not been in contact with her family or editors since 5 April, and western sources say she, along with fellow US citizen and GlobalPost reporter James Foley, Spanish photographer Manuel Varela do Seijas Brabo and South African photographer Anton Lazarus Hammerl were detained. Gillis, Foley and Brabo have been spotted at the camp, but it is not clear whether Hammerl is being held at the same facility. The Washington Post reports that a fifth journalist, freelancer Matthew Van Dyke from Maryland, has been missing since mid-March.

Globalpost says that it, along with USA Today and The Atlantic, has dispatched a recovery team to the Libyan/Tunisian border, where many detained journalists have eventually been released.

Facebook pages and petitions have been set up to highlight the situation, while The White House has called for the immediate release of the journalists.

It comes as the US, Britain and France are pledging to remain united and maintain their military campaign against Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi’s regime.