29 Abducted Chinese still Being Held as China Sends Team to Sudan

None of the 29 Chinese workers abducted after an attack in a volatile region of Sudan have been freed, Chinese state media said Tuesday, dismissing reports that some of the workers had been released.

The workers were abducted Saturday by militants in a remote region in the country's south. Sudanese state media reported Monday that 14 of them had been freed, but the official Xinhua News Agency and China Daily newspaper said all 29 were still being held.

China has close political and economic relations with Sudan, especially in the energy sector.

The Chinese ambassador to Sudan, Luo Xiaoguang, told China Central Television in an interview in Khartoum that anti-government rebels attacked the road project the Chinese were working on.

"There are still Chinese workers missing. Some others are still being held by the anti-government armed forces," Luo said.

Xinhua said 47 Chinese workers were caught in the attack in the South Kordofan region of Sudan. It said 29 were captured and the other 18 fled, and that one of those who fled remains missing.

The Foreign Ministry said Tuesday that a working group had been sent to Sudan to assist in the rescue work.

"China calls upon relevant parties to maintain calm and exercise restraint, to ensure the safety of Chinese personnel, and from a humanitarian point of view, to the release of Chinese personnel as soon as possible," the statement said.

A statement from the workers' company, Sinohydro Corp., said that it and the Chinese Embassy would "spare no effort in ensuring the personal safety of those abducted and rescuing them."

On Monday, Sudan's state-run SUNA news agency quoted South Kordofan provincial governor Ahmed Haroun as saying that 14 workers had been released.

SUNA said the attack took place near Abbasiya town, 390 miles (630 kilometers) south of Khartoum.

Sudanese officials have blamed the attack on the Sudan People's Liberation Movement-North, a branch of a guerrilla movement that has fought various regimes in Khartoum for decades. Its members hail from a minority ethnic group now in control of much of South Sudan, which became the world's newest country only six months ago in a breakaway from Sudan.

Sudan has accused South Sudan of arming pro-South Sudan groups in South Kordofan. The government of South Sudan says the accusations are a smoke screen intended to justify a future invasion of the South.