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IRAQ-KIDNAP (UPDATED) Jan-17-2005 (370 words) With photo. xxxi
Vatican condemns kidnapping of Syrian Catholic archbishop in Iraq
By John Thavis
Catholic News Service
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- A Catholic archbishop was kidnapped in Mosul, Iraq, the latest act of violence against the Christian minority in the country, the Vatican said.
In a statement Jan. 17, the Vatican condemned the kidnapping as a "terrorist act" and urged that the archbishop be released immediately.
The Vatican identified the prelate as 66-year-old Syrian-rite Archbishop Basile Georges Casmoussa, who ministers to approximately 30,000 Syrian-rite Catholics in the Mosul Archdiocese.
The Vatican gave no details of the kidnapping, but said it had received news of the abduction.
"The Holy See deplores in the firmest manner such a terrorist act and asks that this worthy pastor be quickly restored unharmed to his ministry," the Vatican statement said.
Chaldean Patriarch Emmanuel-Karim Delly of Baghdad, Iraq, said Archbishop Casmoussa was abducted while on a pastoral visit.
"He was kidnapped after he came out of a house where he was making a pastoral visit, in his Archdiocese of Mosul. He was seized and put into a car. We don't know who kidnapped him or the reason for this abduction," Patriarch Delly told the Italian news agency, ANSA.
The patriarch asked for prayers for the archbishop's release. He also said there had been a number of kidnappings of Christians and Muslims in the Mosul area in recent weeks.
Catholics in the northern Mosul region have reported increasing acts of violence and intimidation against Christians in recent months; they attribute the violence to Islamic extremists.
Churches have been bombed, priests and religious threatened, and thousands of Catholics have fled the country for safe haven in Syria and Jordan. The exact number of those who have left is unknown, but Syrian media say up to 70,000 Iraqi Christians now live in Syria.
Most recently, an Armenian Catholic church and the Chaldean Catholic bishop's residence were destroyed Dec. 7 in two separate bomb attacks in Mosul. No one was killed or injured in the attacks.
In October, Archbishop Casmoussa said terrorist groups that bomb Iraqi churches "hope that many, many more Christians will go."
"Their strategy is to create fear among the Christians and push them out of Iraq," he said.
END
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