Iraq makes arrests in kidnapping of security men by Daesh

BAGHDAD/BAQUBA — Iraq’s security forces said on Monday that they had made arrests related to the kidnapping and holding hostage of six of their members by Daesh militants.

The militants had kidnapped six men and on Saturday threatened to kill them in three days unless the government released Sunni Muslim female prisoners.

In a video released by the group, the six men identify themselves as members of the police or the Popular Mobilisation Forces, an umbrella grouping of mostly Shiite Iran-backed militias that fought with government forces against Daesh and nominally report to Prime Minister Haider Al Abadi.

They were kidnapped on the highway connecting Baghdad to Iraq’s north, a road that has seen an uptick in attacks by Daesh in recent weeks.

Abadi met security and intelligence leaders on Sunday and ordered the formation of a special force to secure roads and protect travellers, the security forces said in a statement. 

“This force was able to arrest elements from the terrorism and crime gangs that are related to the recent kidnapping incident on the road to Kirkuk province recently,” it said.

Abadi declared final victory over the hardline militants in December but the group still operates from pockets along the border with Syria and has continued to carry out ambushes, assassinations and bombings across Iraq.

Also on Monday, attackers slit the throats of a mother and three sisters of an Iraqi election commission employee in their home, security and medical sources said.

The employee himself, from the Turkmen minority in the town of Hamrin in ethnically mixed Diyala Province, was not at home at the time and was unharmed, the sources said. No group has claimed responsibility for the killings late on Sunday.

Daesh threatened to attack Iraq’s May parliamentary election and anyone who assisted in it. At least one candidate was killed before the vote but the group did not claim responsibility for his killing.

The militants have lost the one-third of Iraq’s territory they once controlled, but still operate from pockets along the border with Syria and other areas including the Hamrin mountains.