Iraqi authorities are actively searching for Elizabeth Tsurkov, an Israeli-Russian academic kidnapped in Baghdad in March 2023, the Mesopotamian country’s National Security Adviser Qasim al-Araji said on Wednesday.
“Iraqi authorities are working under the prime minister’s direction” to solve the issue, he told AFP.
“The security services are actively working to locate her and identify the group responsible for her kidnapping,” al-Araji said, adding that no one has claimed responsibility or made demands for her release.
“We must operate discreetly and through intermediaries to track her down,” he said.
Israeli journalist Barak Ravid said on Jan. 23 that Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein told him that Tsurkov is alive and that Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani is working to secure her release.
On Jan. 11, Emma Tsurkov, the sister of Elizabeth, told JNS that Donald Trump’s return to the White House as president of the United States gives her family hope for the captive’s release.
“We are very hopeful that the incoming [U.S.] administration will put an end to the lack of accountability and lawlessness that the Iraqi government is allowed to get away with,” Emma Tsurkov said.
Elizabeth Tsurkov has been held captive in Iraq by Iranian-backed Shi’ite militia Kata’ib Hezbollah (“The Battalions of the Party of God”). Washington has designated the group (a separate and distinct organization from the Lebanese Hezbollah) as a terrorist organization.
