A MAN has been quizzed about the rape of a 17-year-old girl in Blackburn town centre.

The 23-year-old Asian man was arrested at 2.20pm yesterday as a result of media appeals made through the Lancashire Evening Telegraph, police said.

He was detained at the Greenbank Station in Whitebirk and questioned by detectives about the rape.

The girl, from the Preston area, said she began talking to a man in the Grapes Hotel, Northgate, while out on a night out with friends last Friday.

Police said she was separated from her friends and, as she did not know Blackburn, the man she had met offered to help her find them.

Her friends had gone to get a take away from the Northgate area, but he led her up Richmond Terrace, behind O'Neill's Irish Bar and raped her at 2am on Saturday. The girl then walked down King William Street and turned left into New Market Street, where she found her friends and raised the alarm.

She is said to be extremely upset and shocked at the ordeal.

Detective Inspector Jim Elston said: "We have arrested an Asian male in connection with the sexual assault. He is a 23-year-old local man and was arrested."

The rape is the second alleged sexual assault on a clubber in Blackburn this month.

On June 6, a 35 year-old woman claimed a man, who she met at a nightclub in Preston, tried to attack her at a flat in Johnston Street, Blackburn. The two incidents are not thought to be connected.

Anyone with information on the latest incident should call Blackburn CID on 01254 353569.