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New Zealand PM rules out ransom for citizen abducted in Nigeria

Xinhua, June 23, 2016 Adjust font size:

New Zealand Prime Minister John Key ruled out on Thursday paying a ransom as a long-held government standing for a New Zealander abducted a day earlier by gunmen in southern Nigeria, West Africa.

Key told a press conference that there was no chance of the government paying a ransom for the release of New Zealander being held hostage in Nigeria, saying the compromise would only put a bounty on the head of any New Zealander working in a volatile region and make the situation worse.

Gunmen took at least three foreign contractors, including one New Zealander and two Australians working for an Australian mining company early Wednesday morning and killed their driver on the outskirts of Calabar.

Key said it's likely the kidnapping was random motivated rather than an act of a terrorist organization. The kidnappers are yet to contact police or making any request.

Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said the Australian high commissioner in Nigeria is at the scene while New Zealand has no diplomatic mission in the country limiting its capacity to coordinate the rescue.

The Australian mining giant MacMahon has been working with Nigerian government to resolve the situation as New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs was receiving updates on the situation.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has made Nigeria an extreme risk rating because of the threat from terrorism, kidnapping and violent crime, advising its citizens against all travel in the north and against all tourist and other non-essential travel throughout the rest of the country.

Expatriate workers at oil and gas facilities were often targeted by militant groups in the northern regions of Nigeria where most of the recent kidnappings had happened. Endit