Three Croatian oil workers kidnapped in Nigeria

PORT HARCOURT, Nigeria, Feb 19 (Reuters) Gunmen kidnapped three Croatian oil workers from a bar in Nigeria's oil city Port Harcourt, their employer said today.

The abduction in the city's Iwofe district yesterday night was the latest in a series of attacks against foreign workers in the world's eighth largest oil exporter which have prompted thousands of expatriates to leave and cut output by a fifth.

''They are crew members in our vessels. They were taken at 10 last night and we haven't heard anything since then,'' said David Ross, managing director of Hydrodrive Nigeria, an offshore oil services company.

Oil industry sources said the three Croatian men were drinking in a bar outside their base when gunmen stormed the area and took them away.

It raised to nine the number of foreigners held by different armed groups in the Niger Delta, Africa's top oil-producing region.

An American engineer and his Nigerian driver were released by their captors on Saturday.

Kidnapping for ransom has become an almost weekly occurrence in Port Harcourt since the beginning of the year, and analysts link the upsurge in violence to tension surrounding Nigeria's forthcoming elections.

Nigeria returned to democratic rule in 1999 after three decades of almost continuous army dictatorship, but thuggery is still part of politics.

Elections in April should mark the first time one elected president hands over to another, and tensions are running high amid feuding in the ruling party.

Politicians routinely arm gangs to lay claim to territory and protect votes, and these groups often engage in freelance violence of their own.

Militancy is also on the rise in the delta, a vast wetlands region where poor villages play reluctant host to multibillion-dollar oil platforms, and militant attacks have cut Nigerian oil output by a fifth since last February.

REUTERS AKJ PM1710