Italian women kidnapped in Baghdad

Armed men in military uniforms stormed the Baghdad office of an aid group today and kidnapped two Italian women and two Iraqis.

The attack was only the second known kidnapping of foreign women since the wave of kidnappings began earlier this year. The first involved a Japanese aid worker who was captured in Fallujah in April and released a week later.

About 15 men drove up to the house used by the aid organisation, A Bridge To..., said witnesses.

The men claimed to work for the office of interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi.

Two armed men pushed their way into the office, put guns to the heads of the aid group’s guards and grabbed the four workers, said Jean-Dominique Bunel of the NGO Co-ordination Committee in Iraq.

One Iraqi woman resisted, but they dragged her by her headscarf, threw her into a car and sped away, witnesses said.

“They have been taken hostage,” Bunel said. “We have contacted religious authorities and we have informed their families. We are working for their release.”

The two Italian women were named as Simona Pari and Simona Torretta, both 29. The two Iraqis were identified as Raad Ali Aziz and Mahnaz Bassam.

A witness, who gave his name only as Adnan, said the gunmen arrived in three cars. Another Iraqi man managed to escape.

A government spokesman denied that Allawi’s office was involved, and said that workers had been kidnapped.

“It was a big group,” said Sabah Kadhim, a spokesman for the Interior Ministry, of the kidnappers. “They were wearing military uniforms and flak jackets.”

A spokesman for A Bridge To ..., Lello Rienzi, said in Rome that about 20 armed men stormed their offices, saying they were from an unidentified “Islamic group.”

“We had no sign of danger,” Rienzi said. He said the women “believed they were working in complete security.”

The two Italians were working in water and school projects.

Torretta, who is the head of the organisation’s Iraqi operation, has been in the country since before the war started.

Pari arrived in Iraq in June 2003, and was working on a school project in the capital.

Bunel said he knew of no immediate plans by other private aid organisations to evacuate the country because of the kidnapping. A car bombing last year at the offices of the international Red Cross prompted many aid groups to flee the country, although some returned.

However the recent wave of kidnappings of foreigners has alarmed the international community here and has prompted many organisations to review their security options.

Police sealed off the street where the humanitarian organisation is located in Baghdad’s Wehda neighbourhood.

Insurgents have kidnapped more than 100 foreigners since the US-led invasion in March 2003. Numerous Iraqis have also been abducted by criminal gangs demanding ransoms.