Hella Mewis runs arts programmes at the Bait Tarkib collective in the Iraqi capital.

A German national has been kidnapped in central Baghdad, according to the Iraqi interior ministry.

Hella Mewis has lived in the Iraqi capital for several years, where she worked on establishing the Bait Tarkib collective, which aims to promote the work of young local artists.

She was abducted by unidentified attackers on Abu Nawas Street near the art collective at about 8pm on Monday, Ali al-Bayati, a member of the semi-official Iraqi High Commission for Human Rights, wrote on Twitter.

Interior Minister Othman al-Ghanmi had directed security forces to intensify their efforts to find her, ministry spokesman Saad Maan told dpa news agency.

A security source quoted by AFP news agency on the condition of anonymity said Mewis was “riding her bicycle when two cars, one of them a white pick-up truck used by some security forces, were seen kidnapping her”.

Police officers at the local station witnessed the kidnapping but did not intervene, the source added.

The German Foreign Office has not yet confirmed the kidnapping of Berlin-born Mewis, while the German embassy in Baghdad has not commented.

A friend of Mewis told AFP she had been worried following the killing earlier this month of Husham al-Hashimi, a prominent Iraqi security analyst who had been supportive of anti-government protests that erupted last year when frustrated Iraqis took to the streets to decry rampant government corruption, unemployment and poor services.

“I spoke to her (Mewis) last week, and she was really involved in the protests too, so she was nervous after the assassination,” said the friend Dhikra Sarsam.

In May, a United Nations report said dozens of Iraqi protesters had disappeared during five months of anti-establishment demonstrations. The report did not name who might be behind the abductions, but pointed to “the involvement of armed actors with substantial levels of organisation and access to resources”.

The past year has also seen a spike in abductions of foreigners.

On New Year’s Eve, two French freelance journalists were taken hostage for 36 hours and three French NGO workers were held for two months.

In both cases, neither the kidnappers nor the conditions of their releases were revealed.

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