New York Times reports that the suspect arrested in the kidnapping of an American journalist in Baghdad is a member of Iran-allied Kataib Hezbollah, citing two senior Iraqi security officials.
Iraqi authorities are now operating under the assumption that the same group was responsible for Tuesday’s kidnapping, one of the security officials said. Times.
American freelance journalist Shelly Kittleson has been named by many media as the person kidnapped in the center of Baghdad. Two security sources told AP the hijackers’ car – with a journalist inside – was involved in an accident near the town of Al-Haswa in Babil province, but he was transferred to a second car that fled the scene.
One suspect was arrested after the accident, but the whereabouts of the others and the reporter are not known, the Iraqi Interior Ministry said in a statement.
Kataib Hezbollah is one of the most powerful militant groups in Iraq Times it was reported, and it is the same militants who held Elizabeth Tsurkov – a Russian Israeli doctoral student at Princeton University – hostage for more than two years.
Kataib Hezbollah is also involved in the war in Iran Times he said. The group’s Baghdad compound was hit by US and Israeli airstrikes on February 28, killing three people, officials said.
About two weeks later, the group claimed responsibility for an attack on the US Embassy in Baghdad.
Kittleson has been a longtime freelancer in the region, reporting extensively from Syria and Iraq.
