RIO DE JANEIRO, March 19 (Xinhua) -- Brazilian police rescued in the early hours of Wednesday an Italian teenage girl who was kidnapped four days ago in the seaside resort of Arraial do Cabo in Rio de Janeiro state.

　　The 15-year-old victim, whose name was not disclosed because she is a minor, had been living in Brazil for only five months when she and her father, Italian businessman Ettore Casteluzzo, were snatched Saturday from their home.

　　Casteluzzo was soon released, but kidnappers held on to the girl, who spent four days tied up in the basement of a rented house in a middle class neighborhood of Cabo Frio, a town close to Arraial do Cabo, officials said.

　　Video footage on Brazil's G1 news website showed a police helicopter landing in Rio de Janeiro with the rescued girl, who was then escorted to police vans nearby to be reunited with her father. The girl was covered with a blanket, revealing only her flip-flop clad feet.

　　The kidnappers were demanding a ransom of 720,000 reals (300, 000 U.S. dollars), but police succeeded in rescuing the girl before the money was handed over.

　　Police located the kidnappers by tracing the calls they were making to the father.

　　During the rescue operation, shots were fired and two of the kidnappers, identified as Edson de Souza and Osmar Barbosa, were killed, police said.

　　Each of those men had five prior kidnapping charges, said the police. A third kidnapper, identified as Rodrigo Rodrigues da Silva, escaped.