Iraqi Shia group claims it is holding US citizen prisoner

AN IRAQI Shia faction tied to Iran has claimed it is holding a US citizen, missing since late January. Issa Salomi, a Californian of Iraqi origin, worked as a contractor for the US military. He was apparently abducted on January 23rd when he went to visit family members in the Karada district of Baghdad.

In a video, Mr Issa, wearing a US army uniform, said his abductors were from the League of the Righteous, an offshoot of the Mahdi army militia led by radical Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

The league is demanding the release of militants and the prosecution of five former security guards from the US Blackwater firm – a private military company now called Xe Services – accused of killing 17 Iraqis in a shooting in Baghdad in 2007. The group is also demanding adequate compensation for victims’ families.

Although Blackwater claimed the convoy had come under attack, US investigators found the five, who were escorting US diplomats, had fired indiscriminately on unarmed civilians without provocation.

Last December, a federal judge dismissed indictments on the ground that statements the guards made immediately after the incident had been used by the prosecution in violation of their constitutional rights.

The League of the Righteous was responsible for kidnapping scores of people in 2007 at the Iraqi finance ministry. Among them were British computer consultant Peter Moore and four British bodyguards. Mr Moore was released last December just before the league’s leader Laith Khazali was transferred from a US prison to Iraqi custody and freed.

The seizure of Mr Salomi is an embarrassment to the Iraqi government, which is determined to provide security ahead of the March 7th parliamentary election, and to the Supreme Iraqi Islamic Council, the most pro-Iranian Shia faction in the regime, which formed an electoral alliance with the Sadrists.

The release of the video coincided with bitter recriminations over the banning from the parliamentary race of 500 mainly secular candidates alleged to be loyal to the outlawed Baath party.

This has ratcheted up tensions between the Shia-dominated government and Sunnis and secularists, and led to postponement of campaigning.