British Red Cross worker beheaded in Pakistan.

A long-time Red Cross staffer has been killed by his kidnappers in Pakistan, the International Committee of the Red Cross and British government said Sunday, CNN reported.

Khalil Rasjed Dale, 60, was seized in Pakistan's volatile southwestern province of Balochistan in January.

His body was discovered Sunday, and he appears to have been killed recently, ICRC spokesman Sean Maguire said.

Maguire acknowledged Pakistani press reports that Dale had been beheaded but declined to go into details about how he was killed, saying only: "It was a brutal murder that has left us appalled."

The ICRC has identified Dale's body and will be able to bring it home to Britain, Maguire said.

"We were in touch with the abductors a number of times during Khalil's captivity," he said. "We have called upon the Pakistani authorities to conduct a full and immediate investigation into the murder."

"We are not going to talk about who may or may not be responsible for the killing," he added.