Islamic militants say they are holding 41 foreign nationals hostage at a natural gas plant in Algeria after a Wednesday morning attack that left two people dead, including one Briton.
The Algeria state news agency reported that a British national was among two people that died in the attack. Six others were wounded.
The natural gas plant is a joint venture between British Petroleum, Norway's Statoil and the Algerian Sonatrach company and is located about 1,300km south of the capital close to the Libyan border.
The militants say they have seven Americans among the foreign hostages.
Norwegian energy company Statoil said nine Norwegians and three of its Algerian staff were among the captured.
Reuters reports various sources as reporting that five Japanese workers, a French national, an Austrian, an Irishman, and Britons were also among the hostages.
The attack started when three vehicles carrying armed militants attacked a bus carrying employees from the plant to a nearby airport. The militants were driven off, but then headed for the main gas complex.
Militants went to the living quarters and took foreign workers hostage.
A militant group calling itself the "Battalion of Blood" has claimed responsibility for the attack. The attack was in retaliation for Algeria's support of France's operation against al-Qaeda-linked groups in Mali, according to the Telegraph.