Child Freed, Kidnapper Detained in Thi-Qar

Policemen managed on Tuesday to free a kidnapped child and arrested the woman who kidnapped him in the south of Nassiriya, the chief of the Thi-Qar police said.

“The forces freed the 5-year-old child in Souk al-Shiuokh district, south of Nassiriya,” General Sabah Muhsen al-Fatlawi told Aswat al-Iraq.

“The forces took the 30-year-old women who kidnapped him into custody,” he added, noting that the operation was based on a tip.

“The police had freed last Sunday a child, 4, and arrested her kidnappers in central Nassiriya,” the general noted.

Thi-Qar, 380 km south of Baghdad, has an area of 12,900 square kilometers (4,980.7 sq mi). In 2003 the estimated population of the governorate was 1,454,200 people.

Thi-Qar was the second Iraqi province where security responsibilities were transferred from the Multi-National Force (MNF) to the Iraqis.

The province’s capital is the city of al-Nassiriya. It also includes the ancient Sumerian ruins of Ur, Eridu, Lagash and Ngirsu. Before 1976 the province was known as al-Muntafiq.