Kabul, Dec 08: Authorities were today searching for two Indian road workers kidnapped by heavily armed men in Southern Afghanistan, even as two Turkish engineers and an Afghan kidnapped three days ago near Kabul were freed. The two Indians were abducted Saturday by three armed men in southern Zabul province. A Taliban official has claimed responsibility, but issued no demands for their release.
The Afghan NGO security office, a security group for aid workers which announced that the two Turks and the Afghan had been released, however, gave no details. Afghan officials said the three men, who were helping dig wells, were taken Friday in connection with a land dispute.
"It would appear that this was a domestic incident deriving from a local dispute and did not involve any of the usual extremist elements," Nick Downie, the head of the security office said in a statement.
It wasn't immediately clear where the three men were today and who had been holding them. Afghan government officials, who had been negotiating for the men's release, could not be immediately reached for comment.
A Turkish engineer abducted by the Taliban in late October was released unharmed a month later. He was working for the same US-funded project as the Indians to improve Afghanistan's main highway between Kabul and Kandahar.
The kidnappings have raised new concerns over the security situation for aid workers, particularly in the South and East of the country. Bureau Report