BAGHDAD, July 12 (Xinhua) -- A group of unknown gunmen kidnapped 24 people on Wednesday from the bus station of Muqdadiyah, some 90 km northeast of Baghdad, an Iraqi army spokesman said.

    "Unknown gunmen attacked the Muqdadiyah station parking lot, where buses line up to pick up passengers, and seized up to 24 of them," the spokesman told the media.

    Four kidnapped people were later released by the gunmen near the village of Balloor outside the town of Muqdadiyah, and were found by an Iraqi army force which was chasing the gunmen, the spokesman said.

    The other 20 kidnapped were found shot dead in a nearby village of al-Eseiwed, he added.

    Earlier, a Shiite lawmaker Sheik Jalal al-Din al-Saghir told a session of parliament that about 60 Shiites were abducted in Muqdadiyah.

    But security sources in Diyala, where Muqdadiyah located, put the number at 24 and said that they were both Sunnis and Shiites. Enditem