A Sudanese worker with a Canadian aid agency has been shot to death in the Darfur region of Sudan.
It's the latest in a recent string of attacks on international organizations in Sudan's violent west.
The man, Adam Khatir, 39, worked for the group Fellowship for African Relief. Khatir was killed Monday night by gunmen who entered his home in the town of Kongo Haraza, near Sudan's border with Chad.
FAR country director Mark Simmons told Reuters that Khatir was ambushed on Saturday by men demanding his satellite phone. When he could not provide one, he was beaten.
The men returned to his house Monday night, again demanding a phone.
"He was shot by armed bandits at his home in front of his family last night because he could not provide them the satellite phone they were looking for," Simmons told The Canadian Press by telephone from Khartoum on Monday.
Simmons said the attack was a shock and that this was the first time one of FAR's workers had been killed in the past 24 years.
Tensions have risen in Darfur since the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Sudan's president earlier this month.
The ICC accuses President Omar al-Bashir of allowing atrocities to be committed against civilians in Darfur during battles between government troops and ethnic African rebels.
In 2003, ethnic Africans staged a rebellion, charging that they had been neglected and mistreated at the hands of the Arab-dominated central government.
The resulting war killed 300,000 people and drove 2.7 million more from their homes.
Al Bashir responded to the recent arrest warrant against him by ordering 13 foreign aid agencies out of the region, saying Sudanese aid agencies would take over.
That's left many worried that international aid workers and peacekeepers in Darfur could be targeted for attacks.
Earlier this month, a Canadian woman was among three foreign aid workers kidnapped at gunpoint in Darfur.
Laura Archer, working in the country with the aid group Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), was kidnapped on March 11 while working in Sherif Umra, a rural area in northern Darfur.
Taken with her were Mauro D'Ascanio, an Italian doctor, Raphael Meunier, a French field co-ordinator and Sharif Mohamadin, a Sudanese watchman.
After three days in captivity, they were released by their captors on March 14.
After the abductions, MSF pulled its international staff members from its projects in Darfur. The organization also pulled Sudanese staff from the same projects if they were not from the local area where the kidnapping occurred.
With files from The Canadian Press
