US missionary abducted in Niger capital: diplomatic sources

A US missionary working for evangelical Christian organisation SIM has been abducted in Niger's capital Niamey, officials said Wednesday.

It marks the latest in a spate of kidnappings of westerners this year in northern Niger, a country plagued by militant violence and governed by a military junta for over two years.

The unnamed victim, a man in his 50s, is "already en route for the border with Mali", a stronghold for jihadist groups, a diplomatic source said after he was seized Tuesday.

The US State Department on Wednesday evening confirmed the abduction to AFP, saying the US administration was via its Niamey embassy doing all it could to obtain the man's safe release.

SIM operates in several areas of Niger and across west Africa where it evangelises, assists local churches and hospitals and provides access to drinking water.

According to Wamaps, a collective of journalists in west Africa, the man abducted is "a pilot working with the SIM International NGO and present in Niger since 2010, undertaking urgent humanitarian air transport.

"He was abducted just a few streets away from the presidential palace right in the city centre in a zone which hosts international organisations," the group posted on X.

"None of the terrorist groups operating on Nigerien territory has claimed responsibility and no ransom has been demanded," Wamaps added.

In April, a 67-year-old Swiss woman identified as "Claudia" was kidnapped in the northern city of Agadez, three months after the abduction of Austrian Eva Gretzmacher, 73, in the same city. 

The Islamic State group in the Sahel was considered responsible for the two kidnappings, carried out by local criminal groups on its behalf, according to several observers of jihadist movements in the region.

In October 2020, American missionary Philip Walton was kidnapped in Massalata, a village 400 kilometres (249 miles) from Niamey, near the Nigerian border.

He was freed the same month following intervention by US special forces in northern Nigeria. 

American humanitarian worker Jeffery Woodke was kidnapped by jihadists in October 2016 and freed in 2023.

Since 2023 Niger has been governed by a military junta that took power in a coup. It expelled US and French forces that were assisting in the fight against jihadist violence which has destabilised the country. 

"With our withdrawal from the region, we have lost our ability to monitor these terrorist groups closely but continue to liaison with partners to provide what support we can," the former head of the US Africa Command, General Michael Langley, said at the end of May.

Niger faces deadly attacks from jihadist group Boko Haram near Lake Chad in the country's east as well as from groups linked to Al-Qaeda and Islamic State in the west and the Tillaberi region close to the borders with Burkina Faso and Mali, both similarly affected by jihadist violence.