Iraqi security, al-Arabiya staff deny closing Baghdad office

Jun 25, 2010, 17:03 GMT

Baghdad - Iraqi security denied on Friday that the government demanded the office of the al-Arabiya broadcaster in Baghdad be closed due to possible attacks by an armed group.

The office had earlier been reported shut down after the Interior Ministry received information that armed groups were preparing to attack it.

But an al-Arabiya reporter in Baghdad, Jawad al-Habab, told the German Press Agency dpa that the office was not closed. He said the office had not been informed by the ministry about any attacks, and that they only heard about them from other news reports.

Sources at the Interior Ministry could not be reached for comment.

But Baghdad's Chief of Security, Qassem Atta, told the Aswat al- Iraq news agency that 'reports of possible attacks on al-Arabiya office and the demand from the Iraqi government to evacuate the office are baseless.'

He added that a military force was sent 'to protect the office.'

The Saudi-owned channel and its staff have been attacked by insurgents and pressured by the government before.

In 2008, Baghdad bureau chief Jawad Hattab escaped a car-bomb attack after an explosive device was planted in his vehicle. In February 2006, Al-Arabiya correspondent Atwar Bahjat and two of her colleagues were kidnapped and murdered north of Baghdad.

More than 10 al-Arabiya staff members have been killed since the US-led invasion of Iraq.

The pan-Arab channel was ordered to stop broadcasting from Baghdad for a month in September 2006, after the government accused it of inciting sectarianism and promoting violence.