KHARTOUM: A joint Sudanese-Chadian force is searching for a Chinese engineer kidnapped in Chad along the border of the two countries, a Sudanese army spokesman said on Wednesday.
"We have information that kidnappers took the Chinese engineer into the border areas between Sudan and Chad," Sawarmi Khaled Saad said.
"A joint Sudanese-Chadian force is following the kidnappers, and the Sudanese army is also assisting," he added.
The Chinese national working for an engineering company in Chad was kidnapped last week in the northeast of the country, according to a senior Chadian official, who said the kidnappers and their hostage were on Sudanese territory on Tuesday.
The engineer was seized in Am-Djarass in the Ennedi region, close to the border with Sudan, where he was working on a project "to supply water to the town," the official said.
He is an employee of CGCOC-Chad, the local affiliate of a Chinese construction company that has many branches in Africa and Asia.
Chad’s President Idriss Deby Itno had been on vacation in the Ennedi region since early August, the Chadian official added.
State radio said Deby had ordered the security forces to hunt for the kidnappers, and to "seize their families’ goods and livestock."
Chad and Sudan have strengthened their ties since genocide-accused Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir attended a regional summit in Ndjamena in July.
