Oddly, the Iraqi drivers and translators are full of hopeful tidbits, "The Japanese will be released soon near the border with Jordan," one man told me. But it hasn't happened. Part of the problem is that there are no leaders to talk to, because the hostage-takers belong to cells who are in business for themselves. Money might also be behind it, ransoming off the hostages to acquire weapons and material for the insurgents, but political motives drive the business as well. It is a symptom of hatred as much as it is politics or greed. It's also true that for every kidnapping, there are unreported near misses. Journalists have been detained at improvised checkpoints, threatened by the insurgents and then released. It's clear that passports from coalition countries are bad luck, especially those bearing the seal of the United States.

The day I arrived in Baghdad, Rita Leistner and Adnan Khan were driving back from Karbala after covering the Arbaeen festival. Near the Sunni town of Latifya, just south of the Baghdad they stopped to photograph a burning truck and unwittingly stumbled upon an ambush set up for coalition forces. Khan, a contributing editor for Maclean's magazine, was taking photographs close to abandoned building when he heard shooting coming from inside. As he backed away toward the edge of the village, an insurgent leaned over a wall and started screaming at him with his rifle raised. Another fighter appeared and demanded his camera. Khan gave it to him, and tried to explain that he didn't take any pictures of them, but they didn't believe it. After a period of heated negotiation in the village where local people and their driver argued for their lives, Khan and Leistner returned to their car to find it had been carefully searched by insurgents who wanted to know their nationalities. "They were prepared to kill us. If we had American passports we would have been dead," said Khan. Leistner and Khan are Canadian citizens. Strangely, the threats didn't end when they left the village. On Tuesday, the fighters sent a message to Baghdad through an intermediary threatening to kill them if there were any further American actions in Latifiya.

On Monday morning, I was happy to find a driver and a translator who know Sadr city well. We quickly found a man who could take us to the headquarters of Moqtada Al Sadr in Baghdad, and make the necessary introductions. Our new friend, a clean cut young man, works as a security guard in a hotel complex where many foreigners stay. The three of us drove to Sadr city and stopped in front of the recently rocketed headquarters, while the contact made sure it was ok for us to enter the building. I was searched and then ushered in to see a young man in a large black turban sitting behind a desk. They were all perfectly polite. The room was bare except for the desk, and piled on the desk were posters of a threatening Al Sadr with the caption, "Our followers will go to paradise, your followers will go to hell." The Al Sadr people were ready to talk to the press and had been talking to them for quite a while, it seemed they wanted to make an international impression. A boy with a rifle darted in and out of the office. Other poor young men hid behind the building and ducked out of view when foreigners appeared. "We expect the Americans to come any minute," one of the bodyguards said. It was not unreasonable. An arrest warrant for Moqtada al Sadr has been in force for more than a week and senior US officials have said that they will capture or kill him. Al Sadr was in Najaf which his militia controlled, raising the possibility of an American assault on a Shia holy city.

Amir Al Husseini, chief of Al Sadr's organization in Baghdad, had the unnerving habit of staring at his desk and sighing when he answered questions. If there was an intimation of tragedy, the sighs became audible. I asked him what he thought about the American demand that Moqtada Al Sadr surrender or leave Iraq. "We don't care about their demands because we are fully prepared to give our blood to defend Moqtada al Sadr. They demand his exile because they don't want to confront him, but it will not happen because we will redeem him with our blood." He drifted in and out of religious language, but he was well- spoken and clear in denouncing the wave of kidnappings in Iraq. "We denounce any kidnappings, it is against our religion."

I asked him if we could go to Najaf with a safe passage letter from his office, and Al Husseini wrote it out for me in a careful neat script. They are young earnest men, but I left with the feeling that they are in over their heads. It did not seem that they were nervous, but instead happy and proud to be taking a stand. Amir Al Husseini, who stood next to Moqtada al Sadr in one of the posters, wanted me to know that they were not afraid of death, and for a moment in that office, I believed him.

Driving out of Sadr city, we came on a small lake that formed when a sewer pipe burst. Children with bare feet were playing in the foul water, splashing and kicking in it. At that moment, I looked up and saw the local Iraqi police station crouched next to an American military base. Up on a mast above the station, where the Iraqi flag should have been, was a portrait of Moqtada al Sadr, threatening all enemies with his hand in front of his face.

Late last night we learned last night that the followers of Al Sadr have left the government buildings in Najaf, but I do not believe they have gone far.

I arrived in Iraq in April, 2004, after a series of standby flights from Bangkok to Baghdad. In Jordan, where I tried to hire a car to take me across the border, I learned that insurgents in Anbar province controlled the road and would not let foreigners pass through. I drove to the airport and caught the next flight in. After arriving in Baghdad, I spent a few days trying to understand what had happened to Iraq in the year that I had spent out of the country. This was our introduction to kidnappings and other hazards.

This assignment lasted six months and I returned home only after covering the siege of the Shrine in Najaf in August.

LEAD IMAGE: May, 2004, Najaf, Iraq. A group of Mahdi Militia fighters guard the shrine of Imam Ali after taking over the old city of Najaf.
Video Still: Andrew Berends/Storyteller productions

To contribute or commission a new reporting project in Iraq, click here.