Elderly passerby stops abduction attempt outside tobacco store

The intervention of an elderly passerby saved a delivery man from a potential kidnapping in a remarkable Friday morning attack on the French-Belgian border.

CCTV shows the truck driver stopping to make a delivery at a tobacconist last week, before two men approach him.

The driver is seized by the throat and dragged down the street as a silver sedan pulls up and pops open its boot.

As the two thugs frisk the victim for a set of keys an elderly man in a coat and hat steps in to try and separate them.

Unable to find the keys and unwilling to strike the old man, the pair jump into the silver sedan which reverses quickly down the street.

Police were called but the would-be abductors have not been arrested.

The street literally marks the border between France and Belgium, with the tobacconist located on the Belgian side of the road.

Belgian tobacco stores on the border typically sell a lot of cigarettes because of substantially lower taxes than in France. The video was posted on Facebook by Filip Dekeerle on Saturday, and it has already been seen by 314,000 people.