Gunmen in Iraqi army uniforms kidnapped a senior Iranian
diplomat in Baghdad on Sunday.
"We are treating this as a kidnapping," said an Iraqi government
official on Tuesday.
The official said the diplomat, the second secretary at the
Iranian Embassy in Baghdad, was snatched in central Karrada
district on Sunday by 30 gunmen dressed in uniforms belonging to a
special Iraqi army unit that collaborates with US military forces
in Iraq.
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini blamed
US forces for the kidnapping of Jalal Sharafi, saying his attackers
were attached to Iraq's Defense Ministry "which works under the
supervision of American forces".
The ministry said the Swiss and Iraqi ambassadors to Iran had
been summoned and were to receive formal protests against the
abduction. The Swiss Embassy handles US affairs in Iran, due to it
having no diplomatic relations with Washington.
US forces in Iraq have arrested a number of Iranians, including
diplomats, in the past two months, and are still holding five
Iranians. Washington accuses Teheran of aiding militants fighting
US forces in Iraq with US President George W. Bush having pledged
to disrupt such support.
"It seems that this terrorist act has been committed in the
framework of Bush's order and with the goal of escalating the
confrontation with Iran," Iran's Ambassador to Iraq, Hassan
Kazemi-Qomi, was quoted by Iranian state television as saying.
A US military spokesman denied any US connection to the
incident, which threatens to escalate already tense relations
between the United States and Iran, currently divided over
Teheran's nuclear program.
"We are not aware of any mission that even resembles this
incident," a US military spokesman in Baghdad, Lieutenant-Colonel
Christopher Garver, said.
Hosseini stated Sharafi was kidnapped outside a branch of Iran's
Bank Melli in Baghdad. The Iraqi official revealed the gunmen
pulled up in 4x4s and a BMW and were dressed as members of the
Iraqi 36th Commando Battalion, a special operations unit tied to US
forces.
The official announced that police on the scene opened fire on
the gunmen and arrested six of them. However, in a rather
intriguing turn of events, another security force later came to the
police station and claimed the six to allegedly transport them to
the Serious Crimes building in Baghdad. It was later discovered
that they never arrived there.
Shi'ite Iran resumed diplomatic relations with Iraq following
the fall of Saddam Hussein and the empowerment of Iraq's Shi'ite
majority after US-sponsored elections.
However, the ruling Iraqi government has been critical of recent
raids by American forces arresting Iranians working with diplomatic
offices in Iraq.
(China Daily via agencies February 7, 2007)
