ISIS kidnaps 20 foreign medical workers in Libya

(Image credit: Twitter.com/Alwasatengnews)

last updated 17 March 2015

On Monday, Islamic State militants kidnapped 20 medical workers from the Ibn Sina Hospital in Sirte, Libya, as they waited to take a bus to Tripoli.

A hospital official said that the workers were abducted during an attack on the facility, CNN reports. Most of the workers are from the Philippines, while the others are from Ukraine, Serbia, and India. About 30 ISIS militants took part in the attack, and the hospital official said he believed the staff was kidnapped because they are the only medical team in the city, and the militants wanted them to stay and take care of injured ISIS fighters. ISIS took control of Sirte late last year.

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Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

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