Archbishop Is Freed by Kidnappers In Mosul

Issue 18 is out, but by the time everything was finished one of the stories became post-dated.

Here is the latest update:

Archbishop Is Freed by Kidnappers In Mosul
January 18, 2004
By Doug Struck
Washington Post

BAGHDAD -- Kidnappers on Tuesday released a Catholic archbishop abducted the previous day in the northern city of Mosul, while a suicide bomber struck at the Baghdad headquarters of a leading Shiite Muslim political party. The government, meanwhile, announced that Iraq's borders would be closed for the Jan. 30 elections.

The Vatican said no ransom was paid to free Archbishop Basile Georges Casmoussa, 66, of the Syrian Catholic Church, a branch of the Roman Catholic Church. He was seized and shoved into the trunk of a car Monday as he walked near the al-Bishara church in Mosul.

In an interview with Vatican Radio, Casmoussa said he believed his abductors did not know who he was and freed him after an appeal from Pope John Paul II.

"Thank God for everything. The whole operation was unintentional, because I was released in less than 24 hours. The kidnappers knew that I wasn't the one they wanted," he told reporters in Mosul, according to the Reuters news agency.

Even as Casmoussa was freed, a videotape distributed to Arab television stations indicated that eight Chinese men had been taken hostage.

On the tape, the kidnappers said the men were working for a company with U.S. contracts. Acknowledging China's opposition to the Iraq war, the kidnappers said they nevertheless would kill the hostages in 48 hours unless the Chinese government explained why some of its citizens were working on American projects.

Officials in Beijing said the men had failed to find work in Iraq and were leaving the country when they disappeared last week.

The suicide bombing outside the offices of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, a Shiite party with close ties to Iran, was another in a recent spate of attacks intended to inflame tensions between Shiite and Sunni Muslims. It was the second recent blast aimed at the party; the house of its leader, Abdul Aziz Hakim, was targeted in a car bombing Dec. 27 that killed at least nine others. Hakim was unhurt.

Police and party officials said one man was killed in Tuesday's blast; a U.S. Army officer on the scene said three died. Lt. Col. Kendall Penn said a man had driven up to the party's headquarters and said he worked there. When guards demanded identification, he got back into the car and blew it up, Penn said.

The explosion scattered pieces of the burned car and shattered windows in houses around the office.

"Those terrorists are the cause of our misery" said Um Mahmoud, 62, who said she clutched her daughter when glass from the windows showered them during breakfast. "I hope the government kills them all."

"These explosions are the fireworks of the elections," said Hana Ali, 32, another resident of the neighborhood. "We will hear a lot from now on."

The nearly 19,000 people running for national and local offices have been frequent targets of insurgents. On Tuesday, the Associated Press, quoting unnamed officials, said three candidates had been assassinated since Sunday -- two in the southern city of Basra and one in Baghdad.

In an attempt to improve security, the Independent Electoral Commission said Iraq's borders would be closed for three days during the elections, although Muslim pilgrims returning from the annual hajj in Saudi Arabia will be allowed to pass.

In a meeting with reporters Tuesday, Interior Minister Falah Naqib said he was "very optimistic" that the elections would succeed. But Naqib conceded that "six or seven months are not enough to restore order" in Iraq. The Iraqi interim government took over from U.S. authorities June 28.

The U.S. military said an American soldier was killed Tuesday in a roadside bombing in Baghdad and the Marines announced the death of a third American in fighting in western Iraq on Monday.

In Tikrit on Tuesday, separate attacks killed five policemen and wounded four, according to Reuters. And near Baqubah, an Iraqi policeman was killed and three were wounded in a mortar attack on a police station, U.S. military authorities said.

U.S. military authorities said one Iraqi was killed near Mosul when the truck he was in failed to stop at a checkpoint. Two others were wounded.

Staff writer Cameron W. Barr and special correspondents Omar Fekeiki and Bassam Sebti in Baghdad and Dlovan Brwari in Mosul contributed to this report.