A British citizen has told the BBC that he and several Turkish citizens were kidnapped by masked men in the Kenyan capital Nairobi on Friday, with four of the Turkish citizens still missing.
Necdet Seyitoğlu, who lived in Britain for 18 years before moving to Kenya two years ago, said he was released after eight hours when he showed his alleged captors a copy of his British passport.
In a statement, the British Foreign Office said it was “providing consular support to a British man and his family following an incident in Kenya.”
Kenyan police told the BBC they were investigating a “kidnapping incident” after a motorcyclist witnessed the kidnapping.
According to the report, two vehicles were intercepted and blocked from the front and rear of a silver sedan with two occupants.
“About eight persons armed with weapons emerged from the two vehicles, took out the two occupants” and drove away with them, Kenyan police spokeswoman Resila Onyango said.
“Later, Yusuf Kar, a British citizen of Turkish descent,” reported at a nearby police station and identified the kidnapped men as Hüseyin Yesilsu and Necdet Seyitoğlu.
Turkish authorities have not yet commented on the incident.
Mr. Seyitoğlu, an education consultant, provided additional details about what he said happened during his kidnapping, some of which differ from the police account.
He described a white SUV that intercepted his car as he left home with a friend at 7:30 a.m. local time (04:30 GMT).
The pair were blindfolded and handcuffed by four armed men before being driven to an unknown location, he said.
Repeated requests about what was going on went unanswered, he said.
“We asked them: can you show your ID? Where are we going? But we didn’t get any explanation,” the 49-year-old said.
“It was the worst experience of my life,” Mr Seyitoğlu added.
He said he was eventually able to convince his alleged kidnappers that he was a British citizen by showing them a copy of his passport on this phone.
After taking a photo, the men received a phone call that sounded like it was an instruction to release him, he said.
The masked men, who Seyitoğlu said spoke Swahili, then dropped him off at a place he did not recognize and gave him 1,000 shillings ($7.50; £6) for transportation home, but refused to give back his phone and laptop.
During this time, Mr. Seyitoğlu said his wife reported him missing and informed the British High Commission.
Mr Seyitoğlu said six other people he knew – all Turkish nationals – were also kidnapped in the same way from different locations in Nairobi.
A local law firm, Mukele & Kakai, said in a statement that it was acting on behalf of four men who were registered refugees and warned airlines not to let them on board.
“Our clients have been abducted in Kenya with the aim of being deported back to Turkey, where they are subjected to political victimization,” said the lawyers’ letter, seen by the BBC.
This was echoed by campaign group Amnesty International, whose Kenya spokesperson said he was “deeply concerned by reports that seven asylum seekers from Türkiye have been kidnapped on Kenyan soil”.
The UN’s refugee agency, UNHCR, told the BBC it was “aware of the reports and will provide more information as soon as we have it”.
Additional reporting by Natasha Booty
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