Arab, Kurdish women kidnapped in mixed Iraq city

Two groups of kidnappers seized female relatives of a top Kurdish policeman and an Arab tribal chief within hours in and around the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk, police said on Sunday.

Kirkuk's provincial police chief blamed the kidnappings in the ethnically-mixed city on the release from jail nearly two months ago of five women linked to Al-Qaeda that he admitted had been a "mistake."

The kidnappers could be aiming for a new prisoner exchange, he suggested.

Late on Saturday, four gunmen dressed in military uniform stormed into the home of Hamid Taher al-Barazanji, a policeman whose brother heads the Kirkuk police's internal affairs division.

The gang handcuffed Barazanji and covered his mouth with masking tape before kidnapping his 25-year-old wife Haifa Abdul Saheb, a police officer said, on condition of anonymity.

The officer added that Kirkuk police believed an Islamist group, Ansar al-Sunna, was behind the kidnapping.

Just two hours later in Al-Abu Mohammed, a village 35 kilometres (20 miles) south of Kirkuk city, a separate group of armed men entered the home of Sayakh Thabid al-Ezzi, who heads the Sunni tribe Ezza.

They kidnapped both Ezzi, 52, and his daughter Rima, 18.

"Criminals are trying to arouse sectarian feelings in the Kirkuk community," provincial police chief Major General Jamal Taher Bakr told AFP as he confirmed the first kidnapping.

He tied the abductions to the October 28 release of five jailed women linked to Al-Qaeda in exchange for two kidnapped Kurdish sisters, part of a bid to curb violence in the oil city.

Both Ezzi and Barazanji were involved in negotiations which led to the exchange.

"The police cannot exchange detainees for people who have been kidnapped, because it encourages terrorism," he said. "The exchange of the five women who were released in October was a mistake."
Kirkuk is an oil-rich province that is home to a tense and fragile mix of Kurds, Sunni Arabs, Turkmen, Shiites and Christians.

Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region wants to incorporate the bordering province into its territory, a claim which the Baghdad central government rejects.

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