Gunmen in central Somalia have kidnapped three aid workers - an American woman, a Danish man and their Somali colleague.
The trio work for the Danish Demining Group, which says they were kidnapped about 3 p.m., local time, on Tuesday.
A security official in Somalia's Galmudug region tells VOA Somali Service the woman and two men were seized on their way to an airport in the city of Galkayo.
The official, Ahmed Mahmud Hassan, said the aid workers were preparing to fly out of Galkayo after spending two days teaching locals how to remove land mines.
It is unclear who carried out the abductions.
Over the past month, gunmen have kidnapped four foreigners in northern Kenya and taken them into Somalia. The kidnap victims included two Spanish nationals working for the medical aid agency Doctors Without Borders.
Unidentified gunmen kidnapped French national Marie Dedieu from her private beach home in northern Kenya on October 1. She later died in captivity.
The Kenyan government blames those kidnappings on the Somali militant group al-Shabab, and has sent troops into Somalia in pursuit of the militants. Al-Shabab denies it had anything to do with the kidnappings.
Some information for this report was provided by AP, AFP and Reuters.
