Nigerian kidnappers confess to killing Briton, Italian: Police

Suspected kidnappers of British and Italian engineers confessed to having murdered the two during the attack on their hideout in Nigeria's northern state of Sokoto, security sources said on Saturday.

British engineer, Chris McManus, 28, and his Italian counterpart, Francesca Molinara, 48, who worked for an engineering company in the capital Abuja were killed when a joint rescue operation by British and Nigeria forces stormed the location of their detention on Thursday, sparking off a row between Italy and the UK over the incident.

"We’re questioning them to have a holistic picture of their operation. They're co-operating and we hope to make more arrests to forestall such occurrence in the future," a police source told PTI.

He underlined that the duo were killed by their captors because their hostage takers said they did not see themselves surviving the operation.

Another security source at the headquarters of Nigeria's secret police State Security Service (SSS) in Abuja also disclosed that two of the captors, who made known the location where the two engineers were taken to, were arrested two days ahead of the operation.

One of the captors, Abu Muhammad, was identified as the leader of the group. President Goodluck Jonathan has said they belonged to the radical Islamist militant group Boko Haram which has been involved in a series of violence in the country.

However, the group has denied having a hand in the operation.