A Swiss couple kidnapped on holiday in Pakistan have been smuggled into the lawless tribal belt on the Afghan border, a notorious haven for Taliban and al Qaeda, an official said Monday. Olivier David Och, 31, and Daniela Widmer, 28, were abducted on Friday while driving through impoverished and sparsely populated Balochistan province, which borders Iran and Afghanistan in south-west Pakistan.
"We have information the Swiss couple have been shifted to the tribal areas," provincial home secretary Zafarullah Baloch told AFP. The semi-autonomous region in the north-west has been dubbed by Washington as the most dangerous place on Earth and a global headquarters of al Qaeda.
Parts of the mountainous badlands are subject to American drone strikes against Taliban and al Qaeda commanders, and on the ground the region is considered an intelligence "black hole". Baloch said the couple were probably transferred through the south-western town of Zhob, but did not specify where precisely they were likely to be now.
He said searches would continue in Balochistan and that it was still unclear whether they were kidnapped by criminals or militants. Och is a policeman in canton Bern, while Widmer is a former policewoman from the same force, but a Bern police spokeswoman stressed: "They were travelling in Pakistan in a private capacity."
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