MUZAFFARABAD, July 25: The family of one of the two Pakistanis believed to have been kidnapped in Iraq on Sunday appealed to their captors to release their hostages in the name of Islam and humanity.
The men, identified as Raja Azad and Sajjad Naeem, belong to the southern Poonch district of the Azad Jammu and Kashmir. Both of them were working for the Kuwait-based Al Tamimi group in Baghdad.
When contacted by Dawn by telephone in Bangoin village, some 93 kilometres from here, Mr Azad's family members said that they had been told that he was kidnapped around mid day on Friday in Baghdad.
His brother, Raja Babar, said that he had last spoken to his family on Friday morning, a few hours before his disappearance. "The voice quality was poor and he said he would ring again in the evening, but he never called back and we learnt on the following day from our youngest brother Raja Khurshid who is working in Kuwait that he (Mr Azad) was kidnapped," he said.
Mr Azad, 48, father of five children, had moved to Saudi Arabia some 26 years ago to earn his livelihood. He had visited his family last time in March 2004. He had joined the Kuwaiti group a year ago and was working as a project manager in its maintenance division. He had come to Iraq only two months ago, Mr Babar said.
Mr Azad's wife Kausar Parveen and his sisters wept as this correspondent spoke to the family. "My mother and other female family members are weeping in the other room. My mother is depressed and is unable to talk to anyone," his son Faisal Azad said.
"Our father is a kind-hearted man. He has harmed no one in his entire life. We need him and we appeal for his release," Faisal said. Faisal's elder sister Nazia, 20, said their father had nothing to do with whatever was happening in Iraq, adding that he was just doing his job to raise his family comfortably.
"We don't know anything about his captors, but if they are Muslims we appeal them in the name of Islam and in the name of humanity to release their hostages," she added. Faisal said no government official had contacted them.
"We urge the Pakistan government, particularly President Pervez Musharraf, to direct the Pakistani embassy in Baghdad to take all possible measures to secure the release of our father and the other hostage," he said.
The other hostage Sajjad Naeem is a driver in the same company and also belongs to the same district. His family could not be reached as there was no direct telephone facility in his Horna Mera village, some 125 kilometres from here.
A Rawlakot-based journalist told Dawn that Naeem's father and foreign office spokesman Masood Khan's wife were first cousins. Mr Khan also comes from Horna Mera village.
"Today, a wedding ceremony was to be held in Mr Naeem's family, but the news of his abduction has turned the atmosphere gloomy," journalist Sardar Nazar Mohammad said. He said Naeem's mother had so far not been informed about the abduction of her son.
Al Tamimi has a sub-contract for catering services with US Vice-President Dick Chenney's firm Kellogg, Brown and Root. Sardar Shabbir, one of the partners of the Al Tamimi group, himself belongs to the Poonch district, and had hired hundreds of people from this area and provided them jobs in different Middle Eastern countries.
Late last month, Iraqi insurgents kidnapped Amjad Hafeez, also a resident of district Poonch and an employee of the Al Tamimi group. He was later freed following appeals from his mother and the Pakistani government.
