A Danish businessman is likely being kidnapped in southern Iraq, reports reaching Stockholm quoted the Danish Foreign Ministry as saying on Friday.  

"A Danish citizen in all probability has been detained in Iraq. No Iraqis or Iraqi groups have contacted the Danish authorities," the foreign ministry said in a statement.

Danish Broadcasting News said the man in his 30s was kidnapped late on Tuesday in a town outside Baghdad and he was working on a sewage project in Iraq.

Denmark, which backed the US-led war on Iraq, has 410 troops in Basra and nearby Qurnah.

At least 19 foreigners remained unaccounted for following a wave of abductions by the Iraqi insurgents.

(Xinhua News Agency April 16, 2004)