Four foreign aid workers rescued in Somalia

Colonel Abduallahi Moalim said government soldiers in the Lower Juber region that borders Kenya stopped a vehicle carrying supplies for the attackers on Sunday.

The army seized three of the occupants who directed the force to the hostages, he said. They were being held near the border between the towns of Diff and Dhobley.

"Our forces have rescued the four aid workers kidnapped from Kenya in an overnight rescue operation," Moalim told Reuters.

"They are healthy and unhurt," he said.

Friday's attack at the Dadaab refugee camp was the first abduction of foreigners from Kenya since the east African country sent troops into Somalia in October to crush an al Qaeda-linked insurgency. A Kenyan driver was shot dead during the kidnapping.

The four are staff of the Norweigan Refugee Council (NRC) and come from Canada, Norway, Pakistan and the Philippines.

The NRC declined to comment but said it would be releasing a statement shortly.

Kenya deployed its troops in the Horn of Africa country days after two Spanish women working for Medecins Sans Frontieres were kidnapped at Dadaab last October. They are still being held.

Dadaab, about 100 km (62 miles) from Somalia, was set up in 1991 to house Somalis fleeing violence in their country. It has since become the world's biggest refugee camp with almost 500,000 residents.

(Reporting by Mohamed Ahmed; Additional reporting Victoria Klesty in Oslo and Richard Lough in Nairobi; Writing by Richard Lough; Editing by David Clarke and Louise Ireland)