Afghan kidnap gang arrested
15/01/2008 10:03  - (SA)  

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Kabul - Afghan police have arrested a gang of abductors who chopped off the fingers and toes of their hostages and sent them to families with ransom demands, the interior ministry said on Monday.

The six men operated in the southern town of Lashkar Gah and were arrested on Sunday, ministry spokesperson Zemarai Bashary told AFP.

"They are professional abductors. They used to chop fingers or toes of hostages and send them to their families in packets demanding a ransom," he said.

The gang was caught with knives and other tools that they used and had confessed, he said. They had on three occasions obtained ransoms of between $40 000 and $70 000, he said.

In addition to violence linked to a bloody Taliban-led insurgency, corruption and crime have soared in Afghanistan since the fall of the Taliban in 2001.

Kidnappings in particular have increased, with some abductions carried out by Taliban insurgents for political purposes but most were committed by criminal gangs seeking ransom.

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