Archbishop Basile Georges Casmoussa, the “much-loved” 66-year old head of the archdiocese who was kidnapped at gunpoint yesterday by Iraqi insurgents in the crime-filled northern city of Mosul, was released today without the payment of any ransom. Speaking on Vatican Radio, Casmoussa said he’d been treated well by his captors, and that they seemed to regret kidnapping a cleric. “‘As soon as they found out I was a bishop, their attitude changed…I think my abduction was a coincidence.'” Casmoussa didn’t consider his kidnapping as part of a coordinated attack on the Iraqi Christian population. “‘Based on conversations I had with them, it didn’t appear that they wanted to strike at the Church as such.'”