Free Republic

BAGHDAD, April 10 (Reuters) - A Pakistani diplomat has gone missing in Baghdad, Iraqi police said on Sunday. They said the man had failed to return from prayers at a mosque near his home on Saturday. Scores of foreigners have been kidnapped in Iraq over the past year, some by insurgent groups with political demands and others by criminals seeking a ransom. An Egyptian diplomat was seized by insurgents on his way home from prayers last year but was freed a few days later.

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Kidnappers of Egypt's top diplomat in Iraq threatened to kill him because Egypt has allied with "Jews and Christians," according to a statement posted today on an al-Qaida-linked Web site. Al-Qaida's religious court decided to hand over Ihab al-Sherif to its fighters "to carry out the punishment of apostasy against him," said the statement on the site associated with al-Qaida in Iraq. Under Islam, apostasy, or changing religion, is punishable by death. The statement was ominous because al-Qaida in Iraq, led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, has been responsible for beheading several foreign hostages, including American Nicholas Berg....