AMMAN, April 14: Two more Japanese nationals, including at least one journalist, have been kidnapped in Iraq, a Japanese opposition MP said here Wednesday.

Yukihisa Fujita of the Democratic Party of Japan identified the pair as freelance journalist Junpei Yasuda and the other man simply by his family name Watanabe.

"The two were abducted in Abu Gharib. They were in a taxi on their way to shoot the helicopter which was shot down," he told AFP after a briefing on the latest abductions at the Japanese embassy here by Senior Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Ichiro Aisawa.

He could not say exactly when the pair were grabbed, but a US MH-53 helicopter was forced down by ground fire Tuesday near the flashpoint city of Fallujah, which is just west of Abu Gharib.

Fujita identified Yasuda as a "freelance journalist who used to be a 'human shield' during the war," referring to civilian anti-war campaigners who travelled to Baghdad as the US-led forces faced off against Saddam Hussein's former regime. He had no further information on Watanabe or on who kidnapped them. "Their driver reported their disappearance to an NGO," or non-governmental organization, he added. -AFP