CAIRO, August 21 (IslamOnline.net) - What kind of images are conjured up when one utters ‘Iraq’? Abu Gharib, may be, destruction, chaos, US-led occupation forces and unabated resistance. Gruesome beheadings are also most likely and kidnapping, if not killing, of foreign journalists as a desperate bid to vent anger or to just lay the truth to rest.

With the absence of journalists in Iraq, atrocities could be committed by the US-led occupation troops and go unreported and often unpunished.

Bearing this in mind, Micah Garen, an independent US journalist, went to Iraq trying to independently report on events in Iraq, especially the impact on the Iraqi rich archeological treasures.

On August 13, the same day Shiite fighters loyal to anti-US firebrand Moqtada Al-Sadr have set free Sunday Telegraph journalist James Brandon following a brief abduction, Garen went missing along with his Iraqi translator Amir Doshe in the southern Iraqi city of Nassiriyah, where the Italian forces are stationed.

Garen’s case gets really mixed reporting; whether it was a traditional kidnapping by an Iraqi group like several others making the news day in and day out or disappearance once and for all so that we never know the truth.

The 36-year-old reporter was working on a documentary in Iraq about the looting of archeological artifacts following last year’s US-led invasion.

“He said he was asked to send a message to the American people to work to stop what he called 'the Najaf massacre' ... he added that is receiving good treatment,” the channel said, showing a videotape in which Garen appeared speaking to camera.

But Garen's words “could not be heard”, though he looked physically well.

On Friday, August 20, the alleged group said they would release Garen later in the day “because he disagrees very much with the American administration” and after the mediation of young Shiite leader Sadr.

His fiancée had desperately appealed to the kidnappers to release him.

“I am appealing to Micah Garen's kidnappers to please release him. He was simply doing his job as a journalist by independently reporting on the outcome of recent events in Iraq and by trying to help preserve Iraq's archaeological heritage,” said Marie-Hélène Carleton in a telephone conversation with Reporters Without Borders (RSF).

But Julia Guest, a friend to Garen, has a different interpretation.

In an e-mail to IslamOnline.net, Guest said in the days prior to the abduction, Garen had been investigating the destruction of an Iraqi ambulance by Italian troops and the death of the vehicle's passengers, including a pregnant woman.

“His most recent report to Italy involved the shooting of four civilians who had been killed by the Italian military in an ambulance. This footage not only reached the Italian government, but went out on RAI TV (Italian television),” read the “urgent” missive.

More and more, Garen said in an e-mail sent to a US human rights group funding his reporting and to a New York-based media rights group and later copied to Agence France-Presse (AFP), that he had been banned from the Italian military base outside Nasiriyah after the incident.

The Italians have a different story though.

“The journalist was not kicked out of Camp Mittica ... The journalist stayed with us until August 11 when he handed back the badge that allowed him access to the base saying he was headed to Baghdad,” said Captain Ettore Sarli, a spokes-man for the Italian contingent in Iraq.

But Guest further added that Garen took up lodgings in a Nasiriyah hotel. Within days, he was kidnapped.