(AP)
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Gunmen attacked a camp for a construction company in rural northern Nigeria, killing a guard and kidnapping seven foreign workers from Britain, Greece, Italy, and Lebanon, authorities said today, in the biggest kidnapping yet in a region under attack by Islamic extremists Boko Haram. The overnight attack happened in Jama're, a town in a rural portion of Bauchi state. There, the gunmen first attacked a local prison, burning two police trucks, Bauchi state police spokesman Hassan Muhammed said.
The gunmen then targeted a worker's camp for a construction company called Setraco, which is in the area building a road, Muhammed said. The gunmen shot dead a guard at the camp before kidnapping the foreign workers. Britain's Foreign Office said today it was looking into reports that a UK national had been kidnapped. Nigeria's predominantly Muslim north has been under attack by the radical Islamic sect known as Boko Haram in the last year and a half. The sect is blamed for killing at least 729 people in 2012 alone, according to an AP count.
