Militants abduct 11 de-miners in Afghanistan

GHAZNI (Xinhua) - Militants abducted 11 de-miners in Ghazni province with Ghazni city as its capital 125 km south of Kabul late Saturday night, spokesman for provincial government Shafiq Nang said Sunday.   

"A group of de-miners were on their way from Kandahar to Kabul city when armed militants stopped their bus on the highway in Ghazni province and took away 11 of them to unknown location on Saturday night," Nang told Xinhua.

Without giving more details, he added that search operations had been launched to locate and secure their safe release.

He also didn't rule out the involvement of Taliban militants in kidnapping the de-miners and taking them to Taliban hideouts in Andar district.

Taliban militants have yet to make comment.

However, Taliban had abducted 18 de-miners couple of months ago but set them free after mediation made by tribal elders.