An Iraqi prays for the safety of a relative held hostage in Madaen. (Reuters)

Near Madaen (Iraq), April 17 (Reuters): Iraqi troops backed by US forces mounted fresh raids in a town south of Baghdad today but failed to find any of the Shia hostages reported to have been threatened with death by Sunni guerrillas.

A senior Shia official in Baghdad had said up to 150 hostages, including women and children, were seized on Friday when rebels entered Madaen, situated in an area dubbed the ?Triangle of Death? due to the frequency of guerrilla attacks.

But a police official, who also declined to be named, said there may be as few as three hostages and that the situation was part of a string of tit-for-tat, tribally related abductions.

?Three areas where we suspected there were terrorists were raided but no one was found. There are other areas we will attack soon,? interim national security minister of state Kassim Daoud told parliament.

Iraq?s caretaker Prime Minister Iyad Allawi accused al Qaida?s wing in Iraq, led by Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, of seizing hostages to try to provoke a Sunni-Shia civil war.

But two major Sunni militant groups said the hostage crisis had been fabricated as a pretext to raid Madaen. No group has claimed responsibility for the kidnappings, and an Internet statement issued by Zarqawi?s group said: ?The infidels fabricated the case of the hostages. They are lying.?

Another Sunni insurgent group, the Islamic Army in Iraq, echoed the charge in a separate Internet posting. The authenticity of the statements could not be verified.