IRAQ: Two men who are under arrest in Baghdad over the kidnapping of Irish journalist Rory Carroll last month could receive "heavy prison sentences", a senior Iraqi politician and legal adviser to the country's prime minister said on a visit to Dublin at the weekend.
"They are now held by the Ministry of the Interior in Baghdad. They are in jail, facing justice and under interrogation," said Dr Bahaa al-Araji, legal adviser to the prime minister Ibrahim Jaafari.
Dr al-Araji, a leading member of the Iraqi constitutional committee and head of a 23-member parliamentary group which supports radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, said he was visiting Ireland to give a lecture on the political situation to members of the local Iraqi community.
He told The Irish Times that the Carroll kidnapping was the work of criminal elements who live in a section of Sadr City, the Baghdad neighbourhood where the abduction took place.
Speaking through an interpreter, he said: "Any stranger who would be there, he will be recognised, and he stayed many hours."
When the news broke, Dr al- Araji was contacted by the head of the Shia Muslims in Dublin, Iraqi-born Imam Ali al-Saleh, and by Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Conor Lenihan. Dr al- Araji in turn phoned the local leader of the Moqtada al-Sadr movement in Sadr City.
"The criminals got the news that Sayed Moqtada's followers were going to launch a massive attack on them. They decided to release him [ Carroll]. After three days we identified some of those criminals, we arrested them, now two of them are facing justice."
Dr al-Araji repeatedly stated that no money had been paid for the release of the kidnapped Guardian journalist. "He was our guest. He went there with an invitation from the al-Sadr movement. It was not [ in agreement with] any of the principles or the morals of Islam for him to be kidnapped."
He said the deputy prime minister Ahmad Chalabi had a role in Carroll's release. "Ahmed Chalabi, because of his link with the al-Sadr movement, used his communications, especially with Abdul Zahra, to encourage them to do something and he was following the news by the hour."
Asked if Carroll's Irish citizenship had helped him, Dr al-Araji said: "I told Abdul Zahra and the others with him in Sadr City about Ireland and the help given to the Iraqis in Ireland.
"I told them about the neutral position of Ireland, so they were very much aware about everything related to Ireland and they tried their best to release Rory on the basis that he is Irish and Ireland is his country."