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Foreigners seized in Nigeria

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(CNN) -- The U.S. State Department confirmed that seven people were kidnapped in Nigeria, three of them U.S. citizens, but offered few details.

"Our consulate general in Lagos reports that three American citizens were kidnapped in Bayelsa state," State Department spokesman Gonzalo Gallegos said in a written statement.

"We are in the process of notifying their families, and will maintain contact with Nigerian authorities to monitor this incident."

Four other foreigners were kidnapped in the same incident, he said.

Reuters cited oil industry sources as saying nine foreign oil workers and a Nigerian colleague were kidnapped Friday.

In addition to the three Americans, the workers included four Britons, a South African and a Filipino, industry sources told Reuters.

There has been a wave of kidnappings of foreign workers in the oil-rich Niger Delta. Since late 2005, Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) militants have carried out numerous attacks on Nigeria's oil sector and abducted dozens of foreign workers, releasing nearly all of them unharmed.

Nigeria is Africa's largest oil producer. In 2005, it was the world's sixth-largest exporter of oil, but the conflict there has cut distribution by an estimated 500,000 barrels per day, according to the U.S. Department of Energy.

CNN's Elise Labott contributed to this report.

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