Libya’s Prime Minister, Ali Zeidan has been kidnapped by armed men in Tripoli, according to the London-based BBC.

The Revolutionary Brigades, a militia described as allied to the government, told the UK news agency that its anti-crime department had arrested Zeidan.

Al-Jazeera news reports that Zeidan was taken by the Libyan Revolutionary Operations Chamber, another former rebel group, which is supposed to report to the defence and interior ministries.

“The head of the transitional government, Ali Zeidan, was taken to an unknown destination for unknown reasons by a group”, the transitional General National Congress (GNC) said in a statement on its website.

Zeidan was seized from the Corinthia Hotel in Tripoli, where he had taken up residence. He was appointed in October 2012, following a vote of no confidence against former prime minister Mustafa Abushagur who lasted less than a month in the position.

Zeidan was a diplomat for Muammar Gaddafi in India for two years before defecting in 1980 and joining the National Front for the Salvation of Libya, an exiled opposition group.