The South Korean Foreign Ministry said Thursday that negotiations between the government and armed insurgents who kidnapped nine South Korean workers in Nigeria on Wednesday have been launched on Thursday.

"The government is in talks with the kidnappers and it has confirmed through several channels that the kidnapped workers are safe," Vice Foreign Minister Kim Ho-young told reporters at a news briefing Thursday morning

According to Kim, the kidnappers contacted South Korean officials in Nigeria "with their demands." However, Kim refused to clarify which group was responsible for the kidnapping or what the kidnappers' demands were in consideration of hostages' safety concerns.

South Korean Foreign Minister Song Min-soon, who is in the Philippines for the annual summit of ASEAN and South Korea, China and Japan, held a 15-minute telephone conversation early Thursday morning with Nigeria's acting foreign minister to request the Nigerian government's full cooperation for the prompt and safe release of the kidnapped workers, Kim told reporters.

The Nigerian minister replied "with a sincere apology to the people of South Korea and families of the kidnapped workers," Kim said.

The Nigerian minister told Song that Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo is taking personal interest in the incident and that the Nigerian government will do its utmost to win the safe release of the workers at the earliest date possible, Kim said.

South Korean Ambassador to Cote d'Ivoire Lee Ji-ha and other South Korean officials have been dispatched to Nigeria to lead negotiations with the kidnappers, the Foreign Ministry said.

Deputy Foreign Minister Shim Yoon-joe was scheduled to hold a meeting later in the day with Nigeria's top envoy to Seoul, Ambassador Abba Abdullahi Tijjani, to ask Nigeria's full cooperation on the incident, Kim said.

A group of armed insurgents attacked a construction site of South Korea's Daewoo Engineering and Construction Co. in Nigeria's Ogu area early Wednesday and kidnapped 10 people, including nine South Korean workers and one Nigerian worker.

It was the second time that South Korean laborers were kidnapped in Nigeria since June last year, when five South Korean employees of the Daewoo Engineering and Construction Co. and another South Korean company were held hostage and were released three days later.

Source: Xinhua