IRAQ - Dec 16 - Egyptian Telecoms Executives Detained In Baghdad.

US and Iraqi forces detain two executives of Orascom in Baghdad for unknown reasons. A group believed to include Iraqi National Guard members and US troops stormed the Baghdad homes of the chief security officer of Orascom, which operates the Iraqna mobile phone network, and his deputy. Both are Egyptian citizens. A Cairo-based spokeswoman for Orascom Telecom said a group of Iraqis and foreigners dressed in military uniforms seized money, computers, and mobile phones from the men's houses before detaining the two men. "We are in touch with our Baghdad office to find out what happened", said Dina Abou Zenada, who added she did not know whether the men had been charged. "We are waiting to know what's the crime, or what is the problem". Lt Col Barry Johnson, a spokesman for detainee operations of the multinational forces in Iraq, said he had no information on the detentions. Detaining units have the ability to hold suspects for up to 14 days to gather information and determine whether they pose a security threat. "Both were arrested and taken into custody, but we don't know whether it was American or Iraqi", a senior security executive working with the mobile provider told the FT, speaking on condition of anonymity. "We were told that they had been accused of co-operating with the resistance". Orascom won a licence in October 2003 to run the mobile network in central Iraq for two years. Security advisers working with Iraqna had repeatedly warned that they were coming under pressure from both rebels and US forces as they struggled to maintain mobile service in the insurgent strongholds of Falluja and the western Al Anbar province. While insurgents accused the mobile provider of allowing US forces to intercept their telephone calls, they say Iraqi officials accused the company's Egyptian managers in Baghdad of sympathising with the rebels. Last July Orascom replaced some American and British executives at the company and its British-run security contractor with Lebanese and Egyptian nationals, in order to minimise the threat of abduction. But two Egyptian engineers were taken hostage in Baghdad last September, before being released in October. Orascom's chairman Naguib Sawiris said: It's a very strange episode. We were kidnapped by the bandits and now the US are barging into our offices". He said he felt the company was "being kidnapped from both sides". In a further sign of the politicisation of the country's communications network, a director-general at the communications ministry was assassinated in Baghdad on Dec 15. Qassim Mehawi's duties included the oversight of Iraq's three mobile networks.