A foreigner working in Nigeria was freed by security forces a day after being abducted in the central Plateau state, an official said on Monday.

Nigeria’s Special Task Force, which is made up of both military and police personnel, had started their search after the man failed to turn up for work on Saturday morning.

He was rescued just before midnight on Sunday, Special Task Force spokesman Captain Ikedichi Iweha told Reuters, adding that no ransom was paid and one person had been arrested so far.

A foreigner working in Nigeria was freed by security forces a day after being abducted in the central Plateau state, an official said on Monday.

Nigeria’s Special Task Force, which is made up of both military and police personnel, had started their search after the man failed to turn up for work on Saturday morning.

He was rescued just before midnight on Sunday, Special Task Force spokesman Captain Ikedichi Iweha told Reuters, adding that no ransom was paid and one person had been arrested so far.

The task force had previously identified the abducted man as a Briton, but Iweha only confirmed he was an expatriate worker.

An official at the British High Commission in Abuja earlier said it had received no word of a British national being abducted. The kidnapping of foreign workers by armed gangs seeking ransom money has long been rife in Nigeria’s oil-producing south south and south east.

However, abductions of foreigners in the mainly Muslim north for religious and ideological reasons are also becoming more common.

count | 17

Briton kidnapped in Langtang South regains freedom