French hostages taken to Nigeria - official
2013-02-20 07:56
Yaounde - Kidnappers who seized seven members of a French
family, including four young children, in Cameroon, have taken them across the
border into Nigeria, Cameroon's government has said.
The family - a couple, their children aged 5, 8, 10 and 12
and an uncle - were snatched by six gunmen on three motorbikes on Tuesday.
The abduction of the holidaymakers comes amid fears of
Islamist reprisals over France's military offensive against al-Qaeda-linked
groups in Mali.
"The kidnappers have gone across the border into
Nigeria with their hostages," Cameroon's foreign ministry said in a
statement aired on state television and radio.
The family were abducted early on Tuesday at Sabongari, 7km from
the northern village of Dabanga near the Nigerian border, the foreign ministry
said.
They had earlier visited Waza National Park in the north of
the country, according to a source close to the French embassy in Cameroon.
French energy group GDF Suez confirmed that one of its
employees based in Cameroon's capital Yaounde had been kidnapped along with his
family while holidaying in the north of the west African country.
French President Francois Hollande said during a visit to
Athens that he had been informed of the kidnapping, suspected to have been
carried out by a Nigerian "terrorist group that we know well".
"I note in particular the presence of a terrorist
group, namely Boko Haram, in that part of Cameroon, and that's worrying
enough," he said, adding at the time that France was doing everything
possible to prevent the kidnappers from moving their prisoners to Nigeria.
Several hostage-takings
A Cameroonian security source told AFP: "We have strong
suspicions regarding the Islamist sect Boko Haram," which is blamed for
killing hundreds of people in an insurgency in northern Nigeria since 2009.
A number of Boko Haram members are believed to have trained
with al-Qaeda militants in the Islamic Maghreb (Aqim) in northern Mali.
The French embassy in Yaounde on Tuesday advised all French
nationals in Cameroon's northern border areas to stay indoors.
Though it is the first abduction of Western tourists on
Cameroonian soil, there have been several hostage-takings off the coast
attributed to pirates, and in neighbouring Nigeria.
In December French engineer Francis Collomp was kidnapped in
Nigeria in an act claimed by Nigerian radical Islamist group Ansaru, which is
thought to be a Boko Haram splinter group.
On Monday Ansaru also claimed the kidnapping of seven
foreigners in a deadly weekend raid on a construction site in northern Nigeria.
Claiming responsibility for that attack, Ansaru invoked
"the transgressions and atrocities committed... by European nations in
several places, including Afghanistan and Mali", singling out France in
particular.
Tuesday's abduction brings the total number of French
hostages abroad to 15 - all in Africa, with at least six being held by Aqim.
According to the US monitoring group IntelCenter, France is
the Western country with the highest number of hostages being held, followed by
the United States, with nine.
Cameroon, a former French colony of 20 million people, has
vast ethnic, linguistic and religious diversity and counts no fewer than 10
active rebellions.
- SAPA
