An Indian telecommunications engineer working on a project in Afghanistan has been abducted by Taleban militants in southern Zabul province, officials say.
The man was kidnapped along with his driver at gun-point on the Kabul-Kandahar road in Shahjui district on Friday, officials said.
Speaking to the BBC, a Taleban spokesman said they are deciding on the fate of the hostages and their demands.
In November, another Indian man was abducted and killed by the Taleban.
"We have started search operations in areas where we have received intelligence reports the engineer might be," Gulab Shah Alikhail, a spokesman for the governor of Zabul, told Reuters news agency.
The engineer is employed by an Afghan-registered Bahrain-owned firm and was working on a telecommunications project in the area.
"We are hoping for his safe return and we are working with the government and other relevant agencies to try and solve this as quickly as possible," chief marketing officer of the company, Altaf Ladak, told Associated Press news agency.
Abductions
The Taleban have abducted a number of engineers, including several Turks and Indians, in southern Afghanistan in recent years.
In November last year, another Indian was abducted in the southern Nimroz province. He was killed by the Taleban a few days later.
In one incident, a Turk was killed but others were freed. A British engineer was abducted and killed in Farah province in September.
Two Indians working on a road in southern Zabul province were kidnapped in 2003 but released unharmed two weeks later.
Taleban militants are active in much of south and east Afghanistan. The US-led coalition in the country has about 20,000 troops fighting the insurgents. This year has seen an upsurge in violence linked to militants, with more than 1,400 people killed.
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (Reuters) - Taliban insurgents on Saturday threatened to kill a kidnapped Indian telecommunications worker unless Indians left
Afghanistan.
The Indian and his Afghan driver were kidnapped after gunmen stopped their car on a road in the volatile southern province of Zabul on Friday.
"If India does not pull out all its nationals working in Afghanistan by 6 p.m. (1330 GMT) tomorrow, we're going to kill him," Taliban spokesman Qari Mohammad Yousuf said by telephone from an undisclosed location.
In New Delhi, the Indian foreign ministry said it was sending a team of officials to Kabul to help secure the release of the man, whom it named as K. Suryanarayan. The team included members with hostage negotiation skills.
But it said India was committed to maintaining a presence in Afghanistan to help work on economic development. India has close relations with Afghanistan and is involved in numerous aid and reconstruction projects.
Violence and lawlessness across much of the Afghan south has crippled development, and the main task of thousands of
NATO troops due soon to move into the region will be to ensure sufficient security for reconstruction.
Militants have kidnapped aid agency staff and foreign company workers, who the Taliban say are supporting the Western-backed government. Some have been released but several, including Turks and Indians, have been killed.
Police reinforcements had been sent to Zabul to help with the hunt for the Indian and his driver, said Gulab Shah Alikhail, spokesman for the governor of Zabul.
"By the grace of God, we'll find him soon safe and sound," Alikhail. He declined to comment on the Taliban demand and threat to kill the Indian, a contract worker for Afghan telecommunications company Roshan.
INDIAN PRESENCE
Indian Foreign Secretary Shyam Saran said the Indian government was in touch with the Afghan authorities to establish whether the threat to kill Suryanarayan did indeed came from the people who kidnapped him.
"Our presence in that country is to promote the welfare of the people of Afghanistan ..." he said in a statement.
"We wish to assure the government and the people of Afghanistan that India stands by them and will continue to fulfill its solemn commitments to Afghanistan's development."
Security is a major worry in Afghanistan with Taliban attacks mounting as NATO prepares to double its peacekeeping operations, and the United States hopes to cut its forces there by several thousand.
In a separate incident on Saturday, two Taliban were killed when government troops attacked a Taliban hideout in the volatile southern province of Helmand, a commander said.
About 3,500 British troops are going to be stationed in Helmand province, where the two Taliban were killed in an hour-long clash, said General Rahmatullah Raufi.
U.S. and Afghan opposition forces drove the Taliban from power in late 2001 after the Islamists refused to hand over
Osama bin Laden, architect of the September 11 attacks.
