- Title: IRAQ: ALGERIAN ENVOY TO IRAQ HAS BEEN KIDNAPPED - POLICE.
- Date: 21st July 2005
- Summary: (BN10) BAGHDAD, IRAQ (JULY 21, 2005) (REUTERS) 1. GV/GV/PAN/ZOOM IN: POLICE VEHICLES OUTSIDE THE ALGERIAN EMBASSY (6 SHOTS) 0.47 Initials Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved
- Embargoed: 5th August 2005 13:00
- Keywords:
- Location: BAGHDAD, IRAQ
- Country: Iraq
- Reuters ID: LVA4MXJ7NHEWLQ1Q2CIYJNKYI18M
- Story Text: Algeria's envoy to Baghdad has been kidnapped,
police say.
Gunmen kidnapped Algeria's envoy to Baghdad on
Thursday (July 21), continuing a series of attacks that
have driven frightened diplomats out of the capital.
An employee at the embassy reached by telephone
confirmed that mission chief Ali Billaroussi had been
kidnapped.
Police sources said he was snatched off the street
outside a restaurant along with the embassy's diplomatic
attache, Azzedine bin Fadi, by gunmen in two cars.
Egypt's envoy was kidnapped and killed earlier this
month by al Qaeda's Iraq wing, which vowed to carry out
more attacks on diplomats in the Iraqi capital.
The Egyptian, Ihab el-Sherif, had been expected to
become the first Arab diplomat in Baghdad with the full
title of ambassador since the fall of Saddam Hussein in
2003, an important symbolic gesture.
Two days after he was kidnapped, gunmen fired on cars
carrying the envoys of Pakistan and Bahrain, triggering an
exodus, with many embassies scaling back their operations
over security fears.
Iraq's U.S.-backed government said the attacks were
aimed at depriving it of international legitimacy it
craves, especially in the wider Arab world where nearly all
countries are ruled by Sunnis seen as distrustful of Iraq's
elected Shi'ite leaders.
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