US Award-Winning Journalist Shelly Kittleson Kidnapped In Baghdad: Reports

Shelly Kittleson, a US award-winning freelance journalist, was kidnapped by unidentified people in Baghdad on Tuesday. According to a report by Al-Monitor, sources from the Trump administration were aware of the threat against her and had advised her not to travel to Iraq.

Iraq's Interior Ministry has confirmed that a foreign journalist has been kidnapped in Iraq, however, it did not provide any further details about the identity of the reporter.

"The Ministry of the Interior announces that, in the evening of this day, a foreign journalist encountered an incident of kidnapping by unknown people, and immediately the specialized security forces dispatched their duties to pursue the criminals, according to accurate intelligence information and an intensive field effort to track the path of the kidnappers", the Ministry said in a post on social media.

The ministry stated that while the security forces were pursuing the vehicle belonging to the kidnappers, it overturned. However, the forces were able to arrest one of the accused and seized the vehicles used in the abduction.

"Investigations are still ongoing to fully uncover the circumstances of the incident," read the statement.

Two Iraqi security officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to speak publicly about the case, said the kidnapped journalist was a woman with US citizenship. They said that two cars were involved in the kidnapping, one of which crashed and was apprehended, while a second car fled the scene with the journalist, heading toward the south of Baghdad, reported Associated Press.

A video aired by the Al Arabiya channel, whose authenticity could not be independently verified by NDTV, shows the initial moments of the kidnapping incident. The clip shows armed men stopping her car on a busy street, pulling her out and fleeing.

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It was not immediately clear if the kidnapping was related to the ongoing regional war, but Iran-backed militias in Iraq have launched regular attacks on US facilities in the country since the beginning of the US-Israeli war on Iran.

Since the start of the war, the US embassy has warned of kidnapping risks and urged citizens in the country to leave.

Iraqi militias had also kidnapped foreigners before the war.

Elizabeth Tsurkov, a Princeton graduate student with Israeli and Russian citizenship, disappeared in Baghdad in 2023. After she was freed and handed over to US authorities in September 2025, she said that she had been held by the Iran-allied Iraqi militia Kataib Hezbollah.

The group never officially claimed responsibility for kidnapping her.

(With inputs from agencies)