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Update: Iraq launches probe into abduction of deputy minister: spokesman

Xinhua, September 8, 2015 Adjust font size:

The Iraqi authorities on Tuesday launched an investigation over the abduction of the deputy minister of justice, a Justice Ministry spokesman said.

"Unknown gunmen, in this afternoon, abducted Fares Abdul-Karim al-Saadi, the administrative Acting Deputy Minister of the Justice Ministry and the director general of the ministry's administrative and financial department," the spokesman said.

The ministry has no idea about who were behind the abduction, but Baghdad Operations Command, which is responsible for the security in Baghdad, is investigating the incident, the spokesman said without giving further details.

Earlier in the day, a police source told Xinhua that unidentified gunmen around noon intercepted the convoy of the deputy minister in the predominantly Shiite district of Bunoug and abducted the deputy minister of justice, while a ministry's director general and a bodyguard fled the scene.

The incident came six days after gunmen stormed a Turkish construction company building in the Shiite bastion of Sadr City and kidnapped 18 Turkish workers. Endit