Indian engineer kidnapped in Afghanistan

KANDAHAR : Taliban militants kidnapped an Indian mobile phone contractor in southern Afghanistan, according to the Taliban’s purported spokesman.

An Indian engineer working for the Roshan Company was held up at gun point at 5 p.m. as he was driving on the Kandahar-Kabul highway in the Hassan Kariez district of southern Zabul province, said Ali Khail, a provincial government spokesman.

Khail did not say how he knew the kidnapping took place, saying only that officials had notified him of the abduction.

However the spokesman for the Taliban said the Indian had been taken hostage and that “higher authorities” within the Taliban would soon decide on the captive’s fate.

India’s ambassador to Kabul, Rakesh Sood, said he had heard reports of a kidnapping but was trying to confirm it.