KEY POINTS:
Police found a Korean man being beaten in an Auckland hotel yesterday - four days after he was allegedly abducted from Christchurch.
Details of the crime were still unclear last night but police have called on Korean interpreters to help them with the case.
What is known is that a mystery person phoned the Korean consulate about 1.45pm yesterday, telling staff that a man had been kidnapped and was being held at the Rainbow Hotel on the corner of Nelson St and Wellesley St.
The consulate's staff called police who went to the scene.
They said on arrival they found a man in his 30s being assaulted in room 222 on the hotel's first floor.
The four other Korean men in the room were taken away by police.
At the scene yesterday, a blood-drenched towel sat crumpled beneath a thick spatter of blood on a hallway wall.
Police emergency tape cordoned off the hallway, restricting access to the room.
St John Ambulance staff were called at 2.18pm and took the victim to Auckland Hospital with minor to moderate head injuries.
Police believe two of the four men arrested had abducted the man in Christchurch four days ago.
Auckland City police spokeswoman Noreen Hegarty said last night that details of the kidnapping were still unclear.
Police were not sure how the man spent the last four days, how he got from Christchurch to Auckland or why he was kidnapped.
Neither did they know how long the victim had been held in the Rainbow Hotel. But hotel staff said Room 222 was booked on Wednesday for a stay of one week.
It was not known how many people were staying in the room.
Yesterday's incident appeared to go largely unnoticed by the hotel's mainly Asian guests.
Rainbow Hotel maintenance worker Ronald Li said he saw police arrive in two squad cars.
"It was quiet and then suddenly the police turned up."
Mr Li said officers walked into the hotel front desk area and asked him if he had called police.
When Mr Li said he had not, the officers went to the reception desk before going upstairs.
"We didn't know anything. No one called for help or anything."
The alleged kidnapping comes 14 months after another similar incident involving a Chinese student, Wan Biao.
The 19-year-old's body was found in a suitcase in the Waitemata Harbour in April last year, just hours after his family in China received a ransom demand.
Countdown
* A mystery person rang the Korean consulate about 1.45pm yesterday.
* The person told staff a man had been kidnapped and was being held in an Auckland hotel.
* The police were alerted and went to the hotel.
* They found a Korean man being assaulted by four others in a hotel room.
