Two Pakistanis go missing in Iraq

Two Pakistanis working for a Middle-East firm have gone missing in Iraq, raising fears that they might have been taken captive.

Though their capture has not yet been confirmed, a Pakistani television channel early on Sunday identified the two as Raja Azad and Sajjad Naeem.

Both of them are from Pakistan-administered Kashmir.

The television channel quoted family members as saying that they have lost contacts with the two.

Speculation about their whereabouts come in the wake of recent seizures of foreigners in Iraq.

Muhammad Mamduh Hilmi, a senior Egyptian diplomat, was seized in Baghdad after prayers on Friday by a group calling itself ’Lion of God and Lion of Islam Brigades’.

A group of seven truck drivers -three Indians, three Kenyans and one Egyptian- working for a Kuwaiti firm were seized earlier during the week.

Pakistani troops

Pakistan meanwhile has told the United Nations that it would send troops to Iraq if the Iraqi government asked for them and other Muslim nations also sent soldiers.

Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said that President Pervez Musharraf spoke with UN Secretary General Kofi Annan and discussed the Iraqi situation.

"The President made it clear that we could consider sending troops only if the request comes from the Iraqi government, other Islamic countries also do the same and our parliament approves it," he said.

Pakistan, an Islamic nation of 150 million people, is a key ally of the United States in its war on "terror".

Islamic groups in Pakistan are, however, opposed to helping US-led occupation forces in Iraq and have threatened protests if Islamabad agrees to send troops.

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/4D0454B2-E716-4B72-A614-7D3288936332.htm