AFP: Gunmen have kidnapped several oil workers in southern Nigeria, at least eight of them expatriates, police and diplomatic sources said Friday.
One diplomat, who asked not to be identified, said the foreigners included four Britons, three US nationals, one South African and “possibly a Filipino”.
At the same time it was revealed that a Polish engineer had been abducted Thursday in Warri, an oil town in the Niger Delta.
In London a spokesman for the Foreign Office confirmed that four Britons were among those seized Friday.
The Foreign Office spokesman said no more details were immediately available.
Bayelsa State police commissioner Julian Okpaleke said he had sent a team to the area where the incident took place, in Brass, but they had not reported back by early afternoon.
The attack is the latest in a series mainly attributed to militants seeking a greater share of the region’s oil wealth.
Industry sources said the attack was carried out by 15 gunmen in two boats shortly before 7:00 am (06H00 GMT) Friday offshore from Sangana community in Bayelsa.
It was not immediately clear which company operates the vessel that was attacked nor who employed the men seized.
In the meantime Major Omale Ochagwuba, a spokesman for the Joint Task Force, the military unit in charge of policing the Niger Delta, said the Pole, whom he did not identify, was the chief engineer of Pacific Dredging and Marine Ltd., a company based in Warri.
“He was kidnapped in Orugdo creek near Warri by about six gunmen on a boat. He was on his own without any security, we don’t know what he was doing there,” Ochagwuba said, adding that his men were trying to locate the kidnappers.
Since the start of this month around 40 expatriates linked to the oil industry have been seized in southern Nigeria by a variety of different groups. Most have already been released.