Dozens of kidnapped Iraqis freed

About 70 victims of a mass kidnapping at an office of the Higher Education Ministry have been released, a ministry spokesman said today, but officials were unable to say how many remained captive.

“The latest news I have is that 32 of those kidnapped were released this afternoon,” ministry spokesman Basil al-Khatib said.

“Since yesterday 27 employees were released as well as some others. The total was 40, and now we have additional 32.”

He said Higher Education Minister Abed Theyab has announced that he will stop attending ministry or Cabinet meetings until all the captors have been released.

Since yesterday’s kidnapping – during which dozens of men were handcuffed and loaded aboard about 20 pickup trucks by gunmen dressed in the uniforms of Interior Ministry commandos – there has been confusion about how many people were taken captive and how many were later freed.

The Interior and Defence ministries had insisted last night that only 40 to 50 people were kidnapped from the Higher Education Ministry office, which handles academic grants and exchanges. Theyab, however, had said as many as 150 people were abducted.

Theyab held to his high estimate in an interview Wednesday with satellite broadcaster Al-Jazeera. He also disputed reports of a higher number of people released than al-Khatib had said.

“According to our estimates, a big group of more than 100 people were taken,” Theyab said.

Prime Minister Nouri Maliki said today: “Most of the hostages were freed, but that is not enough for us. We will chase those who did this ugly criminal act.”

Meeting with professors and students at Baghdad University to show of support for the country’s educational institutions, Maliki said: “We regret what happened yesterday. The government’s reaction was strong.”

Some Iraqis said the kidnappers were dressed in new digitally marked uniforms for the Interior Ministry forces that are made in the United States.

But US Maj Gen Joseph Fil, commanding general of the 1st Cavalry Division, which took control of security operations in Baghdad on Wednesday from the 4th Infantry Division, denied that.

“We don’t know what uniforms they had on. ... We are virtually certain they are not those uniforms. Those are hard to get hold of, as they should be. We do not believe they were those new digital uniforms,” Fil told reporters.

Such uniforms are designed to overcome the persistent problem in Baghdad and elsewhere in Iraq of militia and death squad members using stolen or counterfeit Interior Ministry uniforms to gain access to commit crimes and killings.

Elsewhere, a series of attacks killed at least 20 Iraqis, including two journalists, and wounded 47 today.

The US military also announced the combat deaths of three US Army soldiers and three US Marines, raising the number of American war dead to 2,858.

The six all died yesterday, four fighting in the insurgent stronghold of Anbar Province in western Iraq and two whose convoy was hit by a roadside bomb in Baghdad.

Wednesday’s deadliest attack involved a car bomb that killed at least 11 Iraqis and wounded at least 32 near a gasoline station in central Baghdad’s Bab Shargi area, police Lt. Bilal Ali said.

Meanwhile, Iraqi officials continued to offer varying figures regarding the kidnappings at the Higher Education Ministry on Tuesday.

Government spokesman Ali al Dabbagh said 37 people were released and a smaller but unspecified number were still in captivity, state-run Iraqiyah television said.

The Higher Education Ministry said the confusion over the number of victims arose out of the difficulties in determining just how many employees, guards and visitors were in the building during the assault.

A government official,said there still was no exact number available.

Police Lt. Mohammed Kheyoun said, however, that “about 15 to 20 persons are still held by the kidnappers. The search for them is under way, and we hope that we will find them in suspected areas in eastern Baghdad.”

Al-Jazeera, the Arabic-language network, quoted Maha Abdullah, a woman described as a sister of one of the captives, as saying he and at least 10 other people remained in custody.

“The government’s news that most of them were released is false,” Abdullah said.

The two Iraqi journalists who were gunned down died in northern Iraq.

In Mosul, gunmen intercepted the car of journalist Fadia Mohammed al-Taie, killing her and her driver, police said. Al-Taie worked as a reporter for the independent weekly newspaper al-Massar.

In Baqouba, Luma al-Karkhi, who worked for the independent weekly al-Dustor, was shot dead while on her way to work.

With the slayings of al-Taie and al-Karkhi, at least 91 journalists have been killed in Iraq since hostilities began in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count based on statistics kept by the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists. Also, 36 other media employees, including drivers, interpreters and guards, have been killed – all of them Iraqi except for one Lebanese.

In other violence today:

:: A suicide bomber drove his car into a tent where a funeral was being held in the mostly Sunni-Arab neighbourhood of Dora in southern Baghdad, killing three people and wounding 15.

:: A former member of Saddam Hussein’s Baath Party was gunned down outside his home in the city of Kut.

:: Two Shiites were killed by gunmen who set fire to their home in southern Baghdad.

:: In the oil-rich city of Kirkuk, gunmen killed a police officer in a drive-by shooting as he was heading to work.

:: Three bodies, blindfolded with their hands and legs tied, were found by police in east Baghdad.

:: In Baghdad’s northern neighbourhood of Sabaa Abakar, gunmen kidnapped three employees of a government agency that cares for Sunni mosques and shrines nationwide, an official with the group said.