Iraqi insurgents said they had seized four Italians and two Americans on the western outskirts of Baghdad today.
A Reuters journalist saw two captive foreigners, said by the insurgents to be Italians, in a mosque in a village in the Abu Ghraib district. One was wounded in the shoulder. Both were weeping.
US soldiers in a tank in the area near the village of al-Dhahab al-Abyad said they knew some Americans had been taken hostage, but had no details.
"That's why we are sealing off the road," said one soldier. Insurgents told Reuters they had captured four Italians travelling in a four-wheel-drive vehicle with weapons in it.
They said they had seized the Americans in a separate attack. They took the journalist to a mosque, surrounded by about 40 fighters with rocket-propelled grenades and assault rifles, where they said all the hostages had been taken.
The two foreigners could be seen from a distance, but the fighters did not allow them to be filmed.