A Menaka municipal counsellor told AFP that the Frenchman was taken by three armed men who were dressed in turbans on Wednesday evening.

Local officials believe the action against the Frenchman who is in his fifties was planned out in advance.

A local politician said the “kidnappers waited till midnight when power is usually cut until the next day to save electricity, before they carried out their action.”

The victim’s 4x4 car was left untouched in the courtyard of the hotel where he was living. The news was later confirmed by a regional government official in the provincial capital, Gao.

Menaka is 1,500 kilometres (930 miles) north of Mali’s capital Bamako, in the Sahel region which has been the scene of trafficking and smuggling of all kinds by organised crime groups.

Tuareg rebels and Islamic militants with affiliation to Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), roam freely between Mali and its neighbouring countries.

In 2008 and early 2009, two Canadian diplomats and four European tourists were kidnapped by armed men in the same region. They were later released after intense negotiations with the AQIM militants.