Taliban say abducted Indian engineer in Afghanistan

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (Reuters) – Taliban insurgents have
kidnapped an Indian road engineer in southern Afghanistan, a
spokesman for the militant group said on Sunday.

The Indian man, whose identity was not immediately
available, was abducted from his car along with two guards and
a driver from the Khash Rod district of Nimroz province late on
Saturday, he said.

“We have him,” Qari Mohammad Yousuf told Reuters by
satellite phone from an undisclosed location. He gave no other
details.

Afghan Interior Ministry spokesman Yousuf Stanezai
confirmed the abduction, but did not know who the captors were.

The Taliban have kidnapped several Turkish and Indian
engineers involved in roadworks in southern Afghanistan in the
past years. One of the Turkish engineers was killed and the
rest were freed, apparently after ransoms were paid.

In September, Taliban guerrillas abducted and killed a
Briton involved in a road project in neighboring Farah
province.

The latest kidnapping coincides with a rise of violence,
including a series of suicide attacks by Taliban guerrillas
this week in Kabul and in the south, a stronghold of the
Taliban before they were ousted from power by U.S.-led forces
in 2001.

Some 20,000 U.S.-led troops are in Afghanistan, hunting
Taliban fighters and their Islamic allies, such as Osama bin
Laden’s al Qaeda network.

More than 1,100 people, mostly militants, have died in the
Taliban-led insurgency this year in Afghanistan, the bloodiest
period since the Taliban’s ouster. The toll also includes
almost 60 foreign troops, most of them Americans.