Search for missing Britons on

BAGHDAD – Hundreds of Iraqi and US troops cordoned off sections of Baghdad’s Sadr City slum early yesterday and conducted a series of raids in an apparent effort to find five British citizens abducted from a nearby government building the day before, local residents and police said.

British Embassy officials held ongoing talks yesterday with Iraqi officials to discuss the situation, Britain’s Foreign Office said. Britain’s COBRA crisis committee was also to meet for the second day.The five men were pulled out of a Finance Ministry office by about 40 heavily armed men in police uniforms in broad daylight on Tuesday and driven in a convoy of 19 four-wheel-drive vehicles toward Sadr City, according to Iraqi officials in the Interior and Finance ministries.A senior Iraqi official said the radical Shi’ite Mahdi Army militia was suspected in the attack.British Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett said officials were doing all they could to secure the ‘swift and safe return’ of five Britons kidnapped in Iraq.”This is clearly a very distressing time for all concerned,” she said arriving at a Group of Eight meeting in Potsdam, Germany.Foreign Office officials are ‘offering help and assistance to the next of kin’ of the Britons, Beckett said.”It is not helpful at this stage to speculate on what might have happened,” she said.”We are working closely with the Iraqi authorities to establish the facts and doing all we can to secure their swift and safe return.”Soon after the abduction, Iraqi forces established a special battalion of Iraqi soldiers and police officers to search for the men, said Brigadier General Qassim al Musawi, an Iraqi army spokesman.”We are conducting search operations near the site where the abduction took place,” he said yesterday.”Maybe today or in the coming few days, we will find them with the help of secret intelligence.”The US military said in a statement yesterday that it had arrested five suspected militants and one suspected leader of a militant cell during early morning raids in Sadr City.Those arrested were believed part of a cell that smuggled weapons in from Iran and sent militants to Iran for training, the statement said.Nampa-APBritain’s COBRA crisis committee was also to meet for the second day.The five men were pulled out of a Finance Ministry office by about 40 heavily armed men in police uniforms in broad daylight on Tuesday and driven in a convoy of 19 four-wheel-drive vehicles toward Sadr City, according to Iraqi officials in the Interior and Finance ministries.A senior Iraqi official said the radical Shi’ite Mahdi Army militia was suspected in the attack.British Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett said officials were doing all they could to secure the ‘swift and safe return’ of five Britons kidnapped in Iraq.”This is clearly a very distressing time for all concerned,” she said arriving at a Group of Eight meeting in Potsdam, Germany.Foreign Office officials are ‘offering help and assistance to the next of kin’ of the Britons, Beckett said.”It is not helpful at this stage to speculate on what might have happened,” she said.”We are working closely with the Iraqi authorities to establish the facts and doing all we can to secure their swift and safe return.”Soon after the abduction, Iraqi forces established a special battalion of Iraqi soldiers and police officers to search for the men, said Brigadier General Qassim al Musawi, an Iraqi army spokesman.”We are conducting search operations near the site where the abduction took place,” he said yesterday.”Maybe today or in the coming few days, we will find them with the help of secret intelligence.”The US military said in a statement yesterday that it had arrested five suspected militants and one suspected leader of a militant cell during early morning raids in Sadr City.Those arrested were believed part of a cell that smuggled weapons in from Iran and sent militants to Iran for training, the statement said.Nampa-AP