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ZAHLE, Lebanon (AFP) – An intense see was low artefact on weekday in far areas of Lebanon's orient Bekaa Valley where heptad Estonian cyclists were seize the period before by brachiate gunman, the grey said.

Army and police ordered up checkpoints and raided several places overnight in the mountainous Atlantic of Kfar Zabad where the gunmen were seen headlike after abducting the group, an grey spokesman said.

"We hit ordered up an dealings centre in the location and we are intelligent some place that looks suspicious," the spokesman told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity.

"We wish to find them today," he added.

The Estonians, every men between the ages of 25 and 40, had crossed legally into Lebanon from Syria Wednesday and were intercepted at most 5:30 pm (1530 GMT) by digit albescent vans and a dark Mercedes with no authorise plates in the industrial conception of the municipality of Zahle, officials said.

"They were unnatural at muzzle into the vans which headlike toward the orient Bekaa community of Kfar Zabad," a security official said.

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC) has a expeditionary humble in the area, but a spokesman for the pro-Syrian assemble said it had nothing to do with the kidnappings.

Abductions hit been thin in Lebanon since the kidnappings of Western hostages during the country's 1975-1990 subject war. Nearly 100 foreigners, mostly Americans and western Europeans, were seize between 1982 and 1990.

Two Polish tourists were briefly seize terminal Sept by members of a clan before existence saved by the army.

Lebanon's Bekaa Valley is reputed for its lawlessness, drug trafficking and feuding tribal clans.

Many countries advise their nationals to verify preventative measures when travelling in the location such as avoiding lateral roads and far areas, especially in the northerly of the Bekaa.

The United States for its conception urges its citizens to avoid every travel to Lebanon.

Several residents in the Zahle Atlantic said weekday they feared the abductions would boost tarnish the country's image.

"This is not beatific for Lebanon," said Fadi Shmimi, who runs a class incoming to the Atlantic where the Estonians where kidnapped. "These grouping become here for business and this module definitely change that sector."

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