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UPDATE: Three-year-old girl abducted in Nigeria Has Been Released Unharmed
by infomatique | July 5, 2007 at 02:41 pm
353 views | 20 Recommendations | 3 comments
A three-year-old girl has been abducted in the Nigerian oil city of Port Harcourt.
The child, who is thought to be the daughter of a British businessman, was snatched from a car while she was being driven to school.
Kidnappings for ransom are very common in Port Harcourt, located in the oil-producing Niger Delta in southern Nigeria, although abductions of children are rare. Hostages are nearly always released unharmed.
UPDATE:MONDAY JULY 9
The three-year-old British girl who was kidnapped in Nigeria four days ago has been released. Nigerian police said Margaret Hill was in good health, but was being treated for mosquito bites. It is unclear who kidnapped her or if a ransom was paid.
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Most RecentMost Recommended Comments (3)
at 06:02 on July 6th, 2007
Thank you informatique, great dig. Just a little more on it if I may. Here's what the British Commission and the Nigeria Police are saying about the matter:
The spokeswoman of the British Foreign Office in London said:
"We are in touch with the Nigerian authorities and with
the child's family. We are trying to establish, as best we
can, the circumstances in which she was taken and whether
or not she is a British national.
"We do not know who took her. We are in contact with
her parents and are providing assistance. High commission
(embassy) officials are in contact with the Nigerian authorities
and we are calling for her immediate safe release."
Rivers State police spokeswoman, Ireju Barasua, said the girl,
who she named as Margaret Hill, was snatched from the car
in which she was being driven in a traffic jam, adding that
her father is an expatriate, while the mother is a Nigerian.
"They blocked the Isuzu Jeep where the girl was and tried
to open the doors but they were locked," said an eye
witness, Ngelebari Meenam.
He added: "Three of the kidnappers who were armed with
automatic weapons now smashed the window glass of the car
and dragged the girl out and left without firing a bullet."
Force Headquarters Public Relations Officer Haz Iwendi, told
AFP that the British girl was seized at 7:15 am (0615 GMT). Thursday's incident came barely 24 hours after five foreign
oil workers were kidnapped in the Soku region of Rivers State.
Nearly all multinational oil companies operating in the Niger
Delta have moved families of expatriate staff away from the
region and the British foreign ministry has urged all its
citizens to leave.
Meanwhile, no group has claimed responsibility for either
Wednesday's abductions or that of Margaret Hill by Thursday.
However, they were seized after the Movement for the Emancipation
of the Niger Delta (MEND) announced the end of its month suspension
of attacks on oil installations on Wednesday.
MEND announced a truce on June 3 to allow talks with the new
government, but said it would resume attacks after a month
if certain conditions were not met.
Read more here
at 06:33 on July 6th, 2007
Great work, gentlemen.
at 12:35 on July 9th, 2007
iinfomatique & egoigwe Good stuff.