Bangladesh presses kidnappers to hold talks

Bangladesh presses kidnappers to hold talks
REUTERS

DHAKA, FEB 20: Bangladesh said on Tuesday it hadmade a fresh offer to hold face-to-face talks with kidnappers holding three European men hostage in remote, forested hills in the southeast of the country.

"We have sent them a proposal again through a tribal leaderfor holding a face-to-face meeting," said an official in the hill town of Rangamati.

Contact was first made with the kidnappers on Monday but"it produced no immediate result", said the official who asked not to be identified.

Danes Torben Mikkelsen and Nils Hulgaard and Briton TimSelby, who were working on a Danish-financed road project in the Chittagong Hill Tracts, were seized at Guniapara near Rangamati, about 400 km (240 miles) from the capital Dhaka on Friday.

Another Briton, David Weston, 56, was taken captive alongwith a Bangladeshi driver, but later released and told to deliver a ransom demand.

Security officials believe the kidnappers are from ahardline ethnic minority rebel faction based in the Hill Tracts.

Buddhist rebels battled the government in Muslim-majorityBangladesh for greater autonomy for years, but most of the fighters gave up with a 1997 peace deal.

Authorities rejected a demand from the kidnappers towithdraw troops from the area where hostages are being held.

Authorities also rejected a demand for 90 million taka($1.6 million) ransom for the release of the trio.

HOSTAGES REPORTED WELL

State news agency BSS said on Monday Army patrols had beensent to reinforce soldiers who cordoned off a 30-sq-km (11-and-a-half-sq-mile) forest area near the remote Kalapahar (black hill), which can only be reached on foot.

Officials said food and clothing had been sent to thehostages through go-betweens and the three were reported to be well.

The Danes work for Danish construction consultancy firmKAMPSAX, based in Copenhagen.

Weston works for a British firm, Transport ResearchLaboratory, and Selby for another British-based company, Ross Silcock, specialising in highway safety and management. Both were working under contract to KAMPSAX.

Several small factions of Shanti Bahini rebels opposed the1997 peace deal that ended their 25-year fight for autonomy for the 5,500 sq-mile (14,200 sq-km) Hill Tracts bordering India and Myanmar.

Security officials said they believed the kidnappersbelonged to the United People's Democratic Front rebel faction but the group denied responsibility.

"We are being wrongly blamed for the abduction," the groupsaid in a statement sent to Dhaka newspapers.

Ethnic minority guerrillas abducted six employees of RoyalDutch/Shell oil company, including a foreigner, in the Hill Tracts in 1984. They were freed after a ransom was paid.