48 Iran Pilgrims Abducted in Damascus
إقرأ هذا الخبر بالعربية
Forty-eight Iranian pilgrims were kidnapped from a bus in the Syrian capital on Saturday, their embassy's consular chief in Damascus told Iran's state television.
"Armed terrorist groups kidnapped 48 Iranian pilgrims on their way to the airport," Majid Kamjou told the IRIB network, which gave the report on its website.
"There are no reports about the fate of the pilgrims. The embassy and Syrian officials are trying to trace the kidnappers," he said.
Hundreds of thousands of Iranians travel each year to Syria to visit a Shiite pilgrimage site, the Shrine of Zaynab, in Damascus.
Tehran is the staunchest ally of Syrian President Bashar Assad, whose forces are locked in a bloody conflict in Damascus and other cities against rebels his regime describes as "terrorists".
Several dozen Iranian pilgrims and engineers were abducted in December and January, with most being released months later.
Many of the rebels come from Syria's Sunni majority, which is hostile to the support Shiite Iran has shown to the regime of Assad, whose family is Alawite, a Shiite offshoot.
04 August 2012, 15:54
03
What in the world are these Iranians doing in a country engulfed in an uprising with the overwhelming majority of Syrians hostile to Iranians, this makes you think , are these hostages truly pilgrims as they claim or are they there to help the regime in its fight against the rebels?
04 August 2012, 15:58
02
pilgrims?
I seriously doubt these are pilgrims :)
they deserve what they get.
04 August 2012, 16:19
00
Shame on you racists who like the salafists fail to differentiate between civilians and militants..
04 August 2012, 16:33
00
pilgrims eh, I think they probably mean the Arabic form of the word, Hajj, you know like
Hajj Imad Moughneih, Hajj Mouhammad Raad, Hajj Ali Ammar ...
or the way members of the Iranian terrorist group refer to each others
04 August 2012, 18:01
01
about time...they are now getting a taste of their own lousy medicine...
04 August 2012, 20:20
01
Yeah--similar questions. Why would there be pilgrims in an area where there is a civil war? If they are truly innocent pilgrims then I feel bad for them and their family, but if they are not whom they are claimed, then they probably deserved it.
Even if they are 'innocent' pilgrims, they lack a lot of common sense.
04 August 2012, 20:55
00
Get your story straight Ghadanfar were the 48 Iranian revolutionary guards going to the shrine of Zaynab or going to the airport, your TV network said they were going to the shrine but this dude Majid Kamjou said they were going to the airport.
04 August 2012, 21:57
01
Everybody understand this. Chiites dont do tourism. Chiites do not travel for work. Chiites do not travel to fight. The only reason chiites travel is for pilgrimage. Chiites are sooo religious that they are either in their country or on pilgrimage. SO. if ever a chiite is kidnapped outside his country, this is called pilgrim kidnapping.
05 August 2012, 07:34
00
these "pilgrams" are fighters because assad cannot trust his ground troops. he is using iranian and hezbollah solders to fight his ground war and his syrian guard for tank and helicopter attacks. also the hezbollah "pilgrams" are hired assad fighters. wake up world
