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CAIRO, Egypt: A group of 11 foreign tourists and four Egyptians have been kidnapped in a remote corner of southern Egypt and taken across the border to neighboring Sudan, the Egyptian government spokesman said Monday.
Germany said they had been missing since Friday.
Magdy Rady, the spokesman, said the foreign tourists were five German nationals, five Italians and one Romanian.
The tourists were on a trip in Egypt's vast, rugged and mostly uninhabited western desert near the Sudanese-Egyptian borders when they were kidnapped.
The four Egyptians were believed to be tour guides and security guards.
The Italian and German foreign ministries confirmed that five nationals from each of their nations are among those taken.
The German Foreign Ministry said the five German nationals had been missing since Friday. It said it was calling its crisis team together later Monday to launch efforts to help free them.
Details remain sketchy and there was no word on the identity of the kidnappers or their motives.
There is virtually no record of tourists being attacked in the Western desert, though Egypt's Nile Valley has seen several violent incidents in the 1990s when President Hosni Mubarak's government battled an uprising by Muslim militants.
Rady said Egyptian and Sudanese authorities were coordinating on the kidnapping.
"There is no direct contact with the kidnappers. All the contact is indirect through the tourist company" that organized the desert trip, he said.
Small numbers of intrepid foreign travelers have long enjoyed the stark beauty of Egypt's western desert, with its oases and remote Neolithic sites, including cave paintings. The Cave of the Swimmers, immortalized in the 1996 film "The English Patient" is located in the Gilf al-Kebir, the destination of the 11 tourists kidnapped Monday.
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/09/22/news/ML-Egypt-Kidnapped-Tourists.php
Germany said they had been missing since Friday.
Magdy Rady, the spokesman, said the foreign tourists were five German nationals, five Italians and one Romanian.
The tourists were on a trip in Egypt's vast, rugged and mostly uninhabited western desert near the Sudanese-Egyptian borders when they were kidnapped.
The four Egyptians were believed to be tour guides and security guards.
The Italian and German foreign ministries confirmed that five nationals from each of their nations are among those taken.
The German Foreign Ministry said the five German nationals had been missing since Friday. It said it was calling its crisis team together later Monday to launch efforts to help free them.
Details remain sketchy and there was no word on the identity of the kidnappers or their motives.
There is virtually no record of tourists being attacked in the Western desert, though Egypt's Nile Valley has seen several violent incidents in the 1990s when President Hosni Mubarak's government battled an uprising by Muslim militants.
Rady said Egyptian and Sudanese authorities were coordinating on the kidnapping.
"There is no direct contact with the kidnappers. All the contact is indirect through the tourist company" that organized the desert trip, he said.
Small numbers of intrepid foreign travelers have long enjoyed the stark beauty of Egypt's western desert, with its oases and remote Neolithic sites, including cave paintings. The Cave of the Swimmers, immortalized in the 1996 film "The English Patient" is located in the Gilf al-Kebir, the destination of the 11 tourists kidnapped Monday.
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/09/22/news/ML-Egypt-Kidnapped-Tourists.php
