Russian embassy officials in Iraq kidnapped and killed

On June 3, 2006, shortly before 3:00 P.M. a Chevrolet Tahoe carrying five Russian diplomats was cut off by a minivan and a sedan 1,200 feet from the Russian embassy in Baghdad. Gunmen attacked the diplomats’ car in the upscale Mansour neighborhood. One of the diplomats, Vitaly Titov, was severely wounded and died later that day. The other four men were kidnapped. On June 19, the Iraqi insurgents demanded Russian troops withdraw from Chechnya and free all Muslim prisoners in Russia within forty-eight hours, or the diplomats would be executed. On June 25, the terrorists released a hostage video showing one man being beheaded and another shot dead, as well as the body of a third. The next day Russia confirmed that the four diplomats were dead.

On June 28, Putin ordered Russia’s secret services to find and kill the insurgents responsible for kidnapping and killing Russian embassy employees in Iraq. Patrushev, then FSB director, stated that the special services would do everything possible to eliminate the terrorists: “We should ensure that any terrorist who has committed a crime will not avoid the responsibility,”he said. Patrushev added: “This is not a casual assignment. It is in the logic of what we do [i.e., how counterterrorism is understood by the Russian secret services].”

However, it turned out that not Russian secret services, but Coalition forces captured the mastermind of the kidnapping, Omar Abdallah Dad (known as Abu Nur or the Spider) on December, 19 2006. He was handed over to Iraqi forces and brought to justice in Baghdad in May 2007.

See also:

• Secret services given rights to eliminate terrorists abroad