QUETTA, Pakistan (AP) - Gunmen kidnapped a foreigner serving as a regional chief for the U.N. refugee agency in southwest Pakistan on Monday, police said, underscoring the threat to expatriates in a country bedeviled by insurgencies and rising criminality.

The gunmen also wounded the official’s Pakistani driver in the main southwest city of Quetta as the two were leaving for work, senior police official Khalid Masood said. It was not immediately clear where the official is from or the exact scope of his duties.

The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees office in Islamabad declined to immediately comment.

Television footage from the scene showed a UNHCR vehicle rammed against a wall. At least one bullet hole was visible in one door. Security officials were collecting evidence.

Southwest Pakistan is the scene of a low-level insurgency driven by nationalist groups wanting more autonomy for Baluchistan province, but, unlike Taliban and al-Qaida militants fighting in the northwest, the Baluch groups are not known to target foreigners.

However, general crime also has been on the rise in many parts of the country, with kidnappings for ransom a favorite tactic. An Iranian diplomat was abducted in the northwest city of Peshawar last year, and Afghan and other foreigners also have been nabbed.