LAGOS, May 19, 2023 (BSS/AFP) - Nigerian security forces have rescued two local US consulate workers kidnapped after an ambush on their convoy in the south of the country, police said on Friday.

Gunmen killed seven people -- three consulate staff and four police guards -- when they opened fire on the two-car convoy on Tuesday, before abducting two other staffers in southeast Anambra state.

"In the early hours of today..., the joint security forces rescued unhurt the two remaining victims abducted during the attack on a US convoy," Anambra state police said in a statement.

"Operations are still ongoing."

Police say they suspect gunmen from the outlawed Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) separatist group that agitates for the ethnic Igbo people. Criminal and kidnap-for-ransom gangs also operate in many parts of Nigeria.

No US citizen was involved and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said there were no indications the attack specifically targeted the US consulate or staffers.

The US consulate in Lagos did not immediately respond to a message request for comment.

Attacks on diplomats are rare in Nigeria, where President-elect Bola Tinubu takes office on May 29 with armed forces battling security threats ranging from jihadists to criminal gangs and separatists in different parts of the country.

Two suspects linked to the convoy attack have been arrested, police said.
The consulate team were travelling to visit a USAID-funded project providing humanitarian aid for people displaced by flooding in Anambra last year.

Police and naval forces engaged in a gun battle with the attackers who escaped into forests. Security forces raided a camp of suspected separatists on Wednesday, but found it abandoned.

IPOB has been repeatedly accused of targeting police patrols and killing security officers in southeast Nigeria. It persistently denies being behind any violence.

Separatism is highly sensitive in Nigeria, where around one million people died from fighting or starvation in a three-year civil war following the declaration of an independent Republic of Biafra in the southeast by Igbo army officers in 1967.

Separatists still operate in the country's southeast, where they have been blamed for escalating attacks in recent years, usually targeting police or government buildings.