U.S. and Iraqi forces clash with insurgents
At least 18 foreigners are still being held hostage in Iraq.
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- U.S. and Iraqi forces raided suspected insurgent hide-outs in the heart of the capital today, sparking clashes along a main Baghdad thoroughfare. Meanwhile, the release of two Italian women and five other hostages encouraged relatives of foreigners still being held.
Iraqi security forces backed by U.S. troops arrested a suspected terrorist operating on Baghdad's bloodied Haifa Street, cornering him today in a closet as he tried to conceal his face with his wife's underwear, an Iraqi National Guard commander said.
Kadhim al-Dafan is believed to be a key neighborhood leader, responsible for car bombings and other attacks in the area, said Col. Mohammed Abdullah. Five other suspected insurgents were also taken into custody as U.S. and Iraqi forces clashed with rebels on the street.
During the operation, an Associated Press photographer saw about a dozen people rounded up behind a razor wire barrier with their hands tied. It was not known whether they included the six people Abdullah said had been arrested.
The commander said his troops also uncovered large caches of weapons, ammunition and explosives secreted between graves of the nearby Sheikh Omar cemetery.
Haifa Street, a rebel enclave, has been the scene of repeated bombings, firefights and raids in recent weeks. U.S. officials also believe the area is being used to fire mortars at the Green Zone, a heavily fortified area that is home to the U.S. Embassy and government offices.
Released
In a rare bit of good news, the two female Italian aid workers were released Tuesday and returned home just hours later.
The Italians, Simona Torretta and Simona Pari, were wearing full black veils that revealed only their eyes as they were received by the Italian Red Cross in a Baghdad neighborhood, according to video broadcast by the Arab news station Al-Jazeera.
Torretta told reporters outside her home in Rome today that the pair's captors assured them they were not in danger.
Asked if she feared she would die during her captivity, Torretta first said "Yes," but then added that their abductors "reassured us. They understood the work we did."
The two women, both 29, work for the aid group Un Ponte per ... (A bridge to ...), which carries out water projects and helps Iraqi children.
Three Egyptian telecommunications workers abducted last week were also among those freed Tuesday, their parent company, Orascom, announced in Cairo. A fourth Egyptian in the group was freed Monday and two others are still being held.
Treatment
The freed Egyptians said their captors treated them well.
"They didn't torture us. We slept well. They offered us clean food," Alaa Makar told Iraqi TV. "They wanted to know whether this organization belongs to Jews, and we explained ... it is purely Egyptian."
It was unclear what prompted the two separate groups of kidnappers to release their captives, including two Iraqis who had been seized with the Italian women and four captured with the Egyptians, and whether any ransom was paid.
Pari and Torretta were abducted Sept. 7 in a bold raid on the Baghdad office of their aid agency.
News of the Italians' release came after a Muslim leader from Italy met with an influential Muslim association in Baghdad on Tuesday to press for their freedom, though it was not immediately known if there was a connection.
Ransom
Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini, who had visited several Middle East capitals as part of efforts to secure the women's release, flatly denied on Italian state radio that ransom had been paid.
But Gustavo Selva, the head of an Italian parliamentary foreign affairs commission, has told reporters that he believed the money was paid, said Selva's spokesman, Eugenio Marcucci.
The Egyptian charge d'affaires in Baghdad, Farouq Mabrouk, said the kidnappings of the Egyptians were "motivated by financial reasons." But an Orascom spokesman declined to comment on whether a ransom had been paid.
More than 140 foreigners have been kidnapped in Iraq -- some by anti-U.S. insurgents and others by criminals seeking ransom. At least 26 have been killed, including two Americans whose beheadings were recorded on grisly video footage and posted on the Internet last week.
Hopes raised
A Western official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said this week's releases raised hopes for the at least 18 other foreigners still in captivity, including British hostage Kenneth Bigley, who was captured with the Americans from their Baghdad house Sept. 16. But with so many different groups involved in the kidnappings, the diplomat cautioned against drawing any conclusion.
On Tuesday, kidnappers of two French journalists who have been held more than a month in Iraq praised France's "positive steps toward the Iraqi people," a sign that they may be preparing to release their hostages.
In a statement e-mailed to The Associated Press in Cairo and also posted on a discussion board of the Islamic Army in Iraq, the group said it hopes "this is a beginning for a new era of understanding our issues and respect of our constants."
However, the statement did not refer to the French captives, journalists Christian Chesnot and Georges Malbrunot.