DHAKA: Two Spanish journalists have been kidnapped in Syria by a radical Islamist group linked to al-Qaeda.

El Mundo reporter Javier Espinosa and freelance photographer Ricardo Garcia Vilanova were seized by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (Isis).

The newspaper said they were taken at a checkpoint in northern Raqqa province near the Turkish border.

Meanwhile, Syrian activists said a leading human rights lawyer had been abducted near Damascus on Tuesday.

Razan Zaytouna was seized along with three other activists from the eastern suburb of Douma after armed men broke into the office of the Violations Documentation Centre (VDC), which monitors casualties.

The Local Co-ordination Committees (LCC), a network of opposition activists of which Ms Zaytouna is a founding member, demanded their immediate and unconditional release.

There was no claim of responsibility for the abduction, but Ms Zaytouna is reported to have recently received threats from Islamist rebel groups.

In 2011, she was given the Anna Politkovskaya Award by the NGO Reach All Women in War for risking her life by breaking the Syrian government`s media blackout to report on the brutal crackdown on peaceful protests.

Source: BBC
BDST: 1116 HRS, DEC 11, 2013