Seven Red Cross workers kidnapped by gunmen in northern Syria

[HereIsTheNews]

Seven Red Cross workers kidnapped by gunmen in northern Syria

Abduction of six International Committee of the Red Cross workers and one volunteer took place in Idlib province

Associated Press
The Guardian, Sunday 13 October 2013 18.39 BST

A team from the International Committee of the Red Cross were kidnapped after their convoy was stopped in northern Syria. Photograph: Shah Marai/AFP/Getty Images

Gunmen kidnapped a team of seven workers from the International Committee of the Red Cross after stopping their convoy early on Sunday along a roadside in northern Syria, a spokesman said.

Simon Schorno, a spokesman for the ICRC in Damascus, said the abduction took place near the town of Saraqeb in Idlib province at about 11.30am local time (08.30 GMT) as the team was returning to Damascus. Six of the people kidnapped are ICRC staff and one is a volunteer from the Syrian Red Crescent, he said.

Schorno declined to provide the nationalities of the six ICRC employees.

Syria's state news agency, quoting an anonymous official, said the gunmen opened fire on the ICRC team's four vehicles before seizing the Red Cross workers. The news agency blamed terrorists, a term the government uses to refer to those opposed to President Bashar al-Assad.

Schorno said the team of seven had been in the field since October 10 to assess the medical situation in the area and to look at how to provide medical aid. He said the part of northern Syria where they were seized by definition is a difficult area to go in.

Much of the countryside in Idlib province, as well as the rest of northern Syria, has fallen into the hands of rebels over the past year and kidnappings have become rife, particularly of aid workers and foreign journalists.