Monday, October 09, 2006
11 soldiers kidnapped
Security
Eleven soldiers were kidnapped when gunmen overran a military checkpoint in Baghdad on Monday. The gunmen arrived at the Sadr City checkpoint in a minivan and a car at 7 am, said police lieutenant Thaer Mahmoud. They seized all the soldiers on duty and made off. Mahmoud said it did not appear that anybody was shot in the incident. It was not clear who kidnapped the soldiers, but Sadr City is a stronghold of the Mahdi Army militia of the radical Shiite cleric Muqtada Al Sadr. The incident came a day after the US-led coalition killed 30 Mahdi fighters in the predominantly Shiite city of Diwaniyah in southern Iraq.
