Sudan frees Chinese oil worker abducted in W. Kordofan
October 24, 2014 (KHARTOUM) – The Sudanese security services on Thursday managed to free a Chinese oil worker kidnapped in West Kordofan state, also arresting the killers of a Sudanese engineer shot in an armed attack in the Baleela area last week.
Awad praised the government of West Kordofan state and the security apparatus, stressing the government’s keenness to protect foreign investors and oil workers.
The government did not disclose the identity of the abductors or their motivation.
Chinese oil and construction workers in Sudan continue to fall victims to armed conflicts in the country.
On 18 April, an armed group kidnapped three foreign oil workers including two Chinese and an Algerian during an attack on Kanar oil field in West Kordofan state.
Last September, two members of the rebel Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) convicted of killing five Chinese oil workers in Abu Dafra oilfield in West Kordofan state in October 2008 were executed in Khartoums’s Kober prison.
In January 2013, four Chinese nationals were among fifteen workers at a road company taken hostage at gunpoint in Sudan’s volatile Darfur region.
The unidentified assailants abducted the Chinese along with eleven Sudanese colleagues in al-Kouma locality near the North Darfur capital El-Fasher. They were all working for China’s Poly Group Corporation.
In February 2012, the rebels in Sudan’s troubled oil-producing South Kordofan State kidnapped 29 Chinese construction workers. All were released unharmed about two weeks later by the rebel SPLM-N which is active in the area.
(ST)