Saudi businessman abducted in Egypt by masked gang

Hassan Ali al-Sind and his driver were reportedly stopped and held at gunpoint some 76km towards Suez, at which point the pair were abducted and taken off in a car, witnesses told police.

Police said they were contacted after Sind failed to attend a meeting at his workplace, leading them to investigate the road to his work where they found his abandoned and badly damaged car. Other reports suggest Sind was on his way to Cairo airport to return to Saudi Arabia.

The Saudi ambassador to Egypt has said he was closely following the case with Egyptian security services.

Sind's family told Saudi media that "financial extortion" was the likely motive behind the abduction and that the business owner had no personal issues with anyone in Egypt.

Sind's Egyptian business partner is a retired general whose son was reportedly kidnapped three years ago and held for a three million Egyptian pound ($340,000) ransom.

Police are believed to be looking into the possibility the two crimes are connected.

Sind, who was in Cairo on a business trip, is a partner in Al Shams Agro Group - a company dealing with the integrated food industry.

Last year, Saudi Arabia alerted its citizens to be cautious while doing business in Egypt after a Saudi woman and her daughter were killed in a purportedly financially motivated double homicide.

Social media was abuzz on Wednesday with talk of Sind's unusual case.

Some Twitter users expressed concerns about the security situation in Egypt, while others postulated an unlikely link between the kidnapping and the recent protests over Egypt handing over two islands to Saudi Arabia.