Chinese workers freed in Darfur
2013-01-16 21:24
Khartoum - Four Chinese workers abducted at the weekend in
Sudan's western Darfur region have been released, officials and diplomats said
on Wednesday.
Unknown gunmen had kidnapped the Chinese - one engineer and
three drivers working for a road construction company - together with five
Sudanese colleagues on Saturday near al-Fasher in North Darfur.
"The Sudanese government managed to release the four
Chinese in Darfur after intensified negotiations with the kidnappers,"
China's ambassador to Sudan, Luo Xiaoguang, told Reuters. "They are in
good health."
Mohammed Suleiman Rabih, commissioner of al-Kuma
administration in North Darfur, said the Chinese had been handed over to the
international peacekeeper force Unamid.
Officials refused to give any details of the release. Unamid
confirmed the Chinese had arrived at a one of its compounds in South Darfur,
but also would not give details.
Law and order has collapsed in Darfur since mainly non-Arab
tribes took up arms in 2003 against the government in Khartoum, which they
accuse of neglecting them. Gunmen often kidnap foreigners in Darfur to demand a
ransom for their release.
China is Sudan's biggest ally and largest investor in the
oil industry there, as it is also in Khartoum's arch-rival South Sudan. Chinese
firms are ever-present in Sudan, as most Western firms shun the African country
due to a US trade embargo.
Sudan has sought to assure China that it would protect its
firms after rebels in Sudan's main oil-producing state of South Kordofan
kidnapped 29 Chinese workers in January 2012. They were released almost two
weeks later.
In December, a Sudanese court handed out life sentences to
four Sudanese for killing a Chinese worker during a raid on a workers' oil
camp, the state-linked Sudanese Media Centre said. It gave no details.
Beijing has tried to help Sudan overcome the loss of most
oil reserves, the lifeline of the economy, when South Sudan became independent
in 2011.
Last week, Sudan's Finance Minister Ali Mahmoud told Reuters
China had granted the country a $1.5bn loan at a time when Sudan is trying to
stop a slide of its currency.
