NEW YORK (AP) - The fiancee of a journalist snatched off the street in Iraq said he spends much of his time there because of his passion to preserve the country's culture and history.

Marie-Helene Carleton said Micah Garen, who is also her colleague and co-founder of New York-based Four Corners Media, was working on a story about the looting of archaeological sites in Iraq when he was abducted.

Garen, 36, and his Iraqi translator, Amir Doushi, were kidnapped Friday by two armed men in a busy market in the southern Iraqi city of Nasiriyah, Iraqi police said.

According to its Web site, Four Corners is a "documentary organization working in still photography, video and print media." The Web site says Garen is one of the organization's managers, and shows a portfolio of his photos in Iraq.