Kidnapped foreign construction worker executed

A Turkish road construction engineer was killed after he was kidnapped by a group of terrorists as he travelled with his translator and driver on the Jalalabad-Kunar road in eastern Afghanistan, the interior ministry confirmed to IRIN on Wednesday. According to Lutfullah Mashal, a spokesman of the interior ministry, Mohammad Ayub, along with his driver and translator, were kidnapped on Tuesday. Police and elders in the eastern city of Jalalabad did their best to save the man, Mashal said. "The security forces and people from the community reacted quickly. Two [Afghans] were freed but unfortunately the Turkish engineer was killed." There was no claim of responsibility for the killing."We don't know who these terrorists belong to but an investigation is going on," the interior ministry said in a statement. "These terrorists are the enemies of peace, reconstruction and stabilisation in Afghanistan and they do not want the people of Afghanistan to live in a peace." The killing came almost two weeks after the release of three UN election workers who were kidnapped from the capital Kabul in late October. Annetta Flanigan from Northern Ireland, Kosovan Shqipe Habibi and Filipino Angelito Nayan were abducted at gunpoint when a group of armed men in camouflage stopped their vehicle, pulling them out and driving them away at high speed. They were released unharmed on 23 November. Pakistani officials announced on Saturday that security forces had arrested an Afghan militant leader who allegedly masterminded the month-long kidnap ordeal. Syed Mohammad Akbar Agha, head of Jaishul Muslimeen (Army of Muslims), was captured in a raid in the southern port city of Karachi, information minister Sheikh Rashid told AFP without giving details.