Africa News
Two peacekeepers kidnapped in Darfur (Roundup)
Aug 15, 2010, 11:07 GMT
Nairobi/Khartoum/Amman - Two Jordanian peacekeepers with the United Nations-African Union peacekeeping mission in Darfur (UNAMID) have been kidnapped in Nyala, South Darfur, UNAMID said.
'The officers, who had been walking to a UNAMID transport dispatch point, were 100 meters from their residence in the city's Almatar area when they were blocked by three individuals in a 4 x 4 vehicle,' UNAMID said in statement Saturday evening.
'The perpetrators seized the peacekeepers at gunpoint and sped off.'
The pair were Jordanian police officers, according to the authorities in Amman.
'The information we have indicates that the two officers have not been hurt and that they were kidnapped (because) of working with the United Nations, not because they are Jordanians,' Ali al-Ayed, Jordan's minister for media affairs, said.
UNAMID is one of the largest peacekeeping forces in the world, and is deployed in Sudan's restive Darfur province to guarantee the safety of hundreds of thousands of people displaced by the region's long conflict.
Kidnappings of aid workers and peacekeepers for ransom has risen in the restive Sudanese province over the last few years.
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