SANNA: Nine foreigners, including women and children, have been kidnapped in a volatile moutainous area of northern Yemen, an official said on Sunday amid conflicting reports over their fate.

Seven Germans, a British engineer and a South Korean woman teacher were seized by Shiite rebels in the Saada region, a local official cited on the defence ministry website said, but a rebel spokesman denied any involvement. The group — including a German couple, three children and two women nurses — belong to an international relief group that has been working at a hospital in Saada for 35 years, the official said. Seoul confirmed that a South Korean woman, Eom, 34, had been missing since Thursday.