A group affiliated to al-Qaida warned the U.S. military to stop its massive search for the three soldiers abducted Saturday in Baghdad, saying it is the only way to keep them safe.

"Your soldiers are in our hands. If you want your soldiers' safety, do not search for them," the group's Internet posting said Monday.

The group also said the weekend attack on an American convoy in which the soldiers were captured was in revenge for the rape and murder of a local 14-year-old Abeer Qassim al-Janabi and the killings of her parents and her younger sister last year.

The three soldiers disappeared after a deadly ambush on their patrol in in Mahmoudiya, about 30 kilometres south of Baghdad. Four of their comrades were killed in the attack, as was an Iraqi soldier, who was acting as their interpreter.

Neither the identities of the soldiers nor their unit have been reported by the U.S. Army, which is still awaiting identification and notification of next of kin.

The ambush was one of the worst strikes by the Sunni Arab militant group against U.S. forces in Iraq since the invasion in 2003. It came in the midst of President George Bush's deployment of 30,000 more troops, due in Iraq by June, in what is seen as a final push to halt a slide into all-out civil war between majority Shi'ites and Sunni Arabs.

The U.S. army has been engaged in searching work after the attack. About 4,000 U.S. troops backed by aircraft, intelligence units and Iraqi forces have been scouring the farming area around Mahmudiyah and the nearby town of Yousifiyah.

Last June al-Qaida abducted two U.S. soldiers in the same area where Saturday's ambush took place. Their badly mutilated bodies were found days later.