DEFIANT: Archbishop Rahho had told the church not to pay any ransom for his release.

The body of Archbishop Paulos Faraj Rahho, 65, was found by church workers in a shallow grave in the northern city of Mosul following a tip-off from his captors.

It was not immediately clear how he had died.

He was an archbishop in the Chaldean sect - a branch of the Roman Catholic Church which forms the biggest Christian community in Iraq. There were as many as 800,000 of them before the 2003 US-led invasion, though many have been killed or kidnapped by Sunni and Shi'ite Islamists and criminal gangs since then.

The cleric was abducted on Feb 29 as he returned home from a Mass in Mosul.

Church officials said gunmen sprayed his car with bullets, killed two bodyguards and shoved him into the trunk of a car. In the darkness, he managed to call the church on his cellphone, telling them not to pay any ransom for his release.

Reports yesterday said the kidnappers had demanded a US$1 million (S$1.4 million) ransom, and a police spokesman said talks had been held between the kidnappers and Archbishop Rahho's relatives.

The kidnappers then telephoned to say that the archbishop was dead, but did not state how it had happened.

Police spokesman Khaled Abdul Sattar said the state of decay of the archbishop's body when he was found suggested he had been dead for around 72 hours.

Archbishop Rahho was known to be suffering from a number of ailments, including high blood pressure and diabetes, and had previously suffered a heart attack.

'There was no trace of any bullets in his body but the important thing is that he died as a result of the kidnapping,' said Mr Raban al-Qas, the head of the Chaldean church in the northern Kurdish region.

Regardless of the manner in which it happened, his death is being treated as murder by the Iraqi government.

'We condemn and denounce this ugly crime and consider it as an aggression that aims to ignite strife among...the Iraqi people,' said Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who pledged last year to protect and support the Christian minority in Iraq.

US President George W. Bush said it was a 'despicable act of violence', while the head of the Catholic Church, Pope Benedict XVI, condemned it as 'inhuman'.

This incident is the latest in a string of attacks on churches, priests and lay Christians in Mosul, which is one of the worst cities in Iraq for attacks on Christians.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, REUTERS, ASSOCIATED PRESS, NEW YORK TIMES