Gunmen kidnapped 16 employees of the Baghdad trading company Al-Saeed Import Export today, Interior Ministry sources said.
The abductions took place in the Mansour district of the capital.
Thousands of Iraqis have been kidnapped in the bloody chaos that has gripped the country since a US-led invasion toppled Saddam Hussein in 2003.
Meanwhile Iraqi authorities today arrested a police major-general accused of corruption and threatening security, sources have claimed.
Ghassan al-Bawi, the police chief in Diyala province northeast of Baghdad, was arrested one day after the authorities arrested his brother, police major Arkan al-Bawi, on accusations of taking part in death squads in Baquba, north of Baghdad.
Sunni Arabs accuse the Shia government of sanctioning death squads, a charge the government denies.
Death squads are a taboo subject with the Iraqi government despite mounting evidence that they operate with impunity in a "dirty war".
Hundreds of bodies have been found since the bombing of a Shi'ite shrine last month touched off reprisals and pushed Iraq to the brink of sectarian civil war.
Most of the corpses had bullet holes, were gagged and showed signs of torture.
Death squads have become more active as Sunni Arabs press on with a violent campaign of bombings and shootings that has killed thousands of people, mostly Shias.