Gunmen attacked a camp for a construction company in rural northern Nigeria, killing a guard and kidnapping seven foreign workers from Britain, Greece, Italy, Lebanon and the Philippines, authorities said Sunday, in the biggest kidnapping yet in a region under attack by Islamic extremists.
Foreigners, long abducted by militant groups and criminal gangs for ransom in Nigeria's oil-rich southern delta, have increasingly been attacked in Nigeria's north as the violence has grown.
Worries about abductions have increased in recent weeks with the French military intervention in Mali, as its troops and Malian soldiers try to root out Islamic fighters who took over that nation's north in the months after a military coup.
Foreigners, long abducted by militant groups and criminal gangs for ransom in Nigeria's oil-rich southern delta, have increasingly been attacked in Nigeria's north as the violence has grown.
Worries about abductions have increased in recent weeks with the French military intervention in Mali, as its troops and Malian soldiers try to root out Islamic fighters who took over that nation's north in the months after a military coup.