Iraqi environmental activist kidnapped at gunpoint
The Iraqi environmental activist, Jassim Al-Asadi. Photo: Facebook
Baghdad (IraqiNews.com) – The well-known Iraqi environmental activist, Jassim Al-Asadi, was kidnapped on Saturday by gunmen and taken to an unknown location.
Nazim Al-Asadi, the brother of the kidnapped activist, said that gunmen kidnapped his brother near the capital, Baghdad, and took him to an unknown destination.
Jassim Al-Asadi, 65, head of the environmental group Nature Iraq, has appeared regularly in local and foreign media to raise awareness of the threats facing the country’s southern wetlands, a UNESCO World Heritage Site imperilled by years of drought, the AFP mentioned.
Nazem Al-Asadi told AFP that his brother was driving his car on the highway coming from the city of Hillah towards Baghdad when two cars stopped him and gunmen in civilian clothes handcuffed his hands and put him in one of the vehicles, and transferred to an unknown location.
Nazem Al-Asadi explained that the incident took place about five kilometers from the capital Baghdad.
Nazem Al-Asadi confirmed that the kidnappers did not contact the family, and the police continue to search for the environmental activist.
Despite the relatively stable security situation after decades of conflict in Iraq, kidnappings and assassinations of activists or officials are still taking place in the country, which is experiencing tribal conflicts, while civil society condemns the proliferation of weapons and the presence of armed factions throughout Iraq.
Jassim Al-Asadi, the Managing Director of the Chibaish office of Nature Iraq, born in the depths of the central marshes of the Southern Iraq in 1957, with a passion for nature since his childhood.
Al-Asadi has been an engineer in the field of water resources and techniques of pumping stations for more than 30 years with government departments in the central and southern Iraq.
At Nature Iraq, Al-Asadi was a team leader of Socio-Economic surveys in more than 10 projects and director of field projects in different areas.
Al-Asadi has many activities in the field of advocacy for water for the Marshes and the Iraqi Wetlands.