The Taliban says it carried out the kidnapping of two young Swiss tourists in a volatile southwestern Pakistani province four days ago.
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A spokesman for the militant group has been quoted as saying that the Swiss have been moved from Balochistan to the neighbouring Taliban heartland of South Waziristan near the Afghan border.
The couple, who were travelling across Pakistan in a camper van, were abducted by gunmen on Friday.
The Taliban spokesman said on Tuesday that the kidnappers would soon be making their demands, which could include a ransom or exchange of prisoners.
Pakistani officials have not confirmed the information. They said that they were working on the case but that there were no clues so far as to where the Swiss might be.
The kidnapping is the first such incident involving Swiss citizens in Pakistan, and authorities in Switzerland have set up a task force combining police and intelligence services to coordinate the case.
The foreign ministry says it has contacted the local authorities in Pakistan as well as the victims’ families in Switzerland.
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Two Swiss reportedly kidnapped in Pakistan
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The Swiss couple, who were travelling across Pakistan in a camper van, were kidnapped by gunmen on Friday in the sparsely populated Balochistan region, which borders both Iran and Afghanistan. “We have information the Swiss couple have been shifted to the tribal areas [on the Afghan border],” Balochistan’s provincial home secretary Zafarullah Baloch told the…
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If you want to start a conversation about a topic raised in this article or want to report factual errors, email us at english@swissinfo.ch.