Hostage Crisis In Iraq!

[Tatsuya]

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Aljazeera television on Thursday aired a silent video of the three Japanese - two men and a woman - and read out a statement addressed to "the friendly people of Japan" from an Iraqi group called Saraya al-Mujahidin.

 

The statement gave Tokyo three days to withdraw its forces from Iraq or have its citizens executed.

 

"We are the sons of Muslim Iraqi people. We were friends and on good terms. Why did you betray us and support the US forces which have violated our soil, our sacred places and land and shed the blood of our children?" demanded the statement.

 

"It is time to retaliate. Three of your nationals are now in our custody and you have either to withdraw, or we will burn them alive."

 

 

Noriaki Imai is an aid worker who

arrived in Iraq one week ago

 

A Japanese government spokesman said Tokyo had no plans to withdraw its troops and demanded the immediate release of its citizens.

 

Japan's NHK television identified them as two journalists and an aid worker. One of the hostages being held by Saraya al-Mujahidin is a woman.

 

The captives were named as as Noriaki Imai, Soichiro Koriyama and Nahoko Takato. Imai, an aid worker, had left for Iraq on 1 April, NHK reported.

 

Controversial mission

 

Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi has been one of the strongest backers of the US-led invasion of Iraq, a stance that has raised concern over Japanese troops being targeted.

 

Japan has sent 550 troops to the southern town of Samawa on a non-combat mission. It is Tokyo's riskiest military deployment since the second world war and critics say it violates the country's pacifist constitution.

 

No Japanese soldier has fired a shot in action or been killed

in combat since 1945 and casualties could undermine

support for PM Koizumi's government ahead of Upper House elections in July.

 

--Koreans freed--

 

Meanwhile, seven South Koreans who were captured near Baghdad on Thursday, have been released.

 

 

US ally South Korea has 600 army

personnel stationed in Iraq

 

The missionaries, all members of an evangelical South Korean Presbyterian church, were travelling in two cars from Jordan to Baghdad when they were seized on Thursday by a group of 25 to 30 armed men on a road just north of the capital.

 

"At first we were scared and afraid of what would happen. I felt a major gap between our culture and theirs," Lim Young-sup, a church minister, told Reuters.

 

A total of eight missionaries were travelling in the cars but one managed to escape, the others said. The remaining seven were blindfolded and taken to a house by the kidnappers, who

initially accused them of being members of the CIA.

 

--Proving innocence--

 

Hong Kwang-chun said the missionaries tried to tell the Iraqis they were NGO workers and meant no harm.

 

"One of us knew some medicine and so we got our medical kit and showed them that we were doctors and nurses," he said. "Then their attitude changed completely and they became very friendly. They gave us food and something to drink."

 

They were held for around five hours, the Koreans said, before being driven back to the outskirts of the capital escorted by their abductors. They were left with all their possessions apart

from $30,000 in cash they had brought into Iraq.

 

US-ally South Korea has 600 military engineers and medics

in Iraq and plans to send 3000 more for reconstruction.

 

The incident took place after two South Koreans were released on Tuesday after they were detained for 14 hours by Shia leader Muqtada al-Sadr's militiamen.

 

--Others captured--

 

Two Arabs have also been captured in Iraq, reported Israeli media on Thursday.

 

 

 

Iraq is becoming increasingly

dangerous for foreigners

In footage from Iranian television that was rebroadcast on Israeli television, the men identified themselves as Nabil Razuk, 30, and Ahmad Yasin Tikati, 33. They identified themselves as aid workers.

 

Antoine Razuk said his nephew, who has an Israeli citizenship and lives in occupied East Jerusalem, was working with the US Agency for International Development (USAID).

 

It was unclear whether Tikati also has Israeli citizenship. The Israeli Mossad security service is overseeing the investigation into the report, reported Israeli security sources.

 

--Briton held--

 

Meanwhile, a British civilian was kidnapped this week in the southern Iraqi city of Nasiriya, the scene of heavy fighting between al-Sadr militiamen and Italian troops, said an occupation official on Thursday.

 

The official named the man as Gary Teeley, a British contractor. British media said Teeley, 37, was said to be a resident in the Middle East and had been working at a US airbase.

 

A Foreign Office official in London confirmed that Teeley

was missing, but would not say what he was doing in Iraq or

comment on the manner of his disappearance.

 

Separately, a Canadian man working for a US humanitarian organisation has been taken hostage in Iraq, a foreign ministry spokesman said Thursday.

 

--more---

 

Japan works on hostage release.

 

A group of kidnappers calling themselves the Mujahideen Brigades have said they will burn their civilian captives alive on Sunday unless Japan pulls its troops out of Iraq.

 

Japan has rejected the kidnappers' demand, saying it would be "playing into the hands of the terrorists" to withdraw.

 

The three Japanese were among 12 overseas nationals kidnapped in recent days in various incidents within Iraq, a seemingly new tactic by insurgents to try to drive a wedge in the U.S.-led coalition.

 

Senior Vice Foreign Minister Ichiro Aisawa, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's special envoy, arrived early Saturday in the Jordanian capital of Amman.

 

Aisawa told reporters: "Our goal is to rescue the hostages", adding that "nothing is beyond us".

 

Hundreds of people staged a candlelight vigil outside the prime minister's office in Tokyo Friday night and demonstrators followed up with more protests Saturday calling for the withdrawal of troops from Iraq.

 

U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney is due in Tokyo Saturday for talks with Koziumi.

 

Japanese reacted in shock and anger at the videotape showing the three Japanese nationals held hostage at gunpoint and threatened with knives.

 

The video was delivered to the Arab television network Al-Jazeera with a written demand: Withdraw Japanese troops from Iraq within three days, or the hostages will be burned alive.

 

Koizumi defended the government's position, when a reporter asked the Japanese leader if "push comes to shove, you wouldn't withdraw?" "We must ensure and do all it takes so it doesn't come to that," Koizumi said.

 

Japan has more than 500 troops on the ground in Iraq, part of a 1,000-strong contingent heading there for humanitarian missions.

 

Japanese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hatsuhisa Takashima told CNN that the troops were in Iraq to help the Iraqi people reconstruct their country.

 

The sending of troops has stirred up controversy in Japan with many critics arguing that the dispatch violates the nation's pacifist constitution.

 

Opinion polls showed most Japanese were against the Iraq war and also opposed to the deployment of troops.

 

Despite the public's initial opposition, Takashima said most people now support the Self-Defense Forces in Iraq.

 

"With the television showing the people of Iraq welcoming the Self-Defense Forces, it has become very popular," Takashima said.

 

Video of the three Japanese hostages shows them being manhandled, humiliated and threatened with guns and knives -- at times, the knives pressed to their throats.

 

The three hostages -- Noriaki Imai, 18, freelance journalist Soichiro Koriyama, 32, and aid worker Nahoko Takato, 34 -- apparently were taken captive while they were traveling overland from Amman to Baghdad.

 

---Also---

 

Tape shows apparent U.S. hostage

Search on for other foreign nationals missing, kidnapped in Iraq

 

An Australian television network broadcast footage on Saturday of armed militants in Iraq holding a man who appeared to be an American, as U.S. and coalition forces searched for foreign nationals who have been kidnapped or reported missing in recent days.

 

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation showed a car stopping on a highway and masked, armed men getting out and asking journalists to look at a hostage, who was sitting in the back seat next to a gunman.

 

A journalist asked the man what happened and the man, white and middle-aged, replied in a slight Southern U.S. accent that "they attacked our convoy. That's all I'm going to say."

 

It is unclear if the man on the video is referring to an incident Friday when a fuel convoy was attacked near Baghdad International Airport.

 

He gave his name. Then the men got into the car and drove off.

 

The network said the video was shot on the road between Baghdad and Fallujah, where U.S. Marines have been fighting pitched battles with insurgents for control of the town.

 

Marines have paused in their strikes on Fallujah, with coalition authorities asking for talks between Iraqi authorities and insurgents. Sporadic fighting continues, however. (Full story)

 

The Pentagon said two U.S. soldiers and four civilian contractors -- some of them American -- are unaccounted for after a fuel convoy was attacked near Baghdad International Airport Friday. The four were from the same company.

 

One U.S. soldier and an Iraqi driver were killed in the incident and 12 people were wounded.

 

U.S. officials in Baghdad are working with the employer of the civilians to try to trace the normal routine, duties and whom the civilians are regularly in touch with in an attempt to piece together what could have happened to them, a State Department official said.

 

The official said "we know that they are missing but we don't know more than that."

 

Meanwhile, the German Foreign Ministry Saturday confirmed that two security people assigned to the German Embassy in Baghdad were missing.

 

An Interior Ministry spokesman said he could not rule out that the two were dead.

 

German media has reported that the men -- members of the elite GSG9 force --were part of a convoy driving from Amman, Jordan, to Baghdad.

 

The rest of the convoy reportedly arrived safely to the embassy, a small office where a handful of diplomats are working.(Full story)

 

A Japanese official arrived in Jordan Saturday to try to learn more about the kidnapping of three Japanese citizens in Iraq, and negotiate their release.

 

A group calling itself the Mujahedeen Squadrons demanded Tokyo withdraw its troops from Iraq by Sunday, or it will kill the hostages. So far, Japan has refused to give into the terrorists' demands.

 

A videotape released Thursday showing the three Japanese nationals held hostage at gunpoint and threatened with knives. (Full story)

 

Protesters packed the streets of Tokyo for a second day on Saturday demanding the government to meet the kidnappers' demands.

 

Two Israeli-Arab foreign aid workers also remain in captivity. Seven South Korean missionaries were released unharmed Thursday, hours after they were taken.

 

--Other developments--

 

Fighting continues in several cities around Iraq. In the southern city of Kut, U.S. troops battled the banned militia loyal to militant Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. The coalition said on Saturday it has control over about 70 percent of Kut. The militia has partial control of Ramadi and full control of Najaf.

 

On Sunday, about 5 million Shiite worshipers are expected to converge on the holy city of Karbala for the festival of Arbayeen, marking 40 days after the death of Imam Hussein. Celebrations will also take place in Najaf. Sunday also marks the end of 40 days of mourning since more than 180 people were killed in Baghdad and Karbala during the Shiite festival of Ashura in March. Fugitive insurgent Abu Musab Zarqawi, believed to have ties to al Qaeda, has called for the killing of Shiites during pilgrimage

 

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[Gryph]

Jeesus Christ that's a long post!

 

And news update, those 3 Japanese hostages will be released after a Sunni diplomatic group went in to negotiate.

 

If you're going to post news, post the latest stuff...geez.

Edited April 10, 2004 by GryphonKlaw

[Agozer]

I honestly haven't got the energy to read all that, but yeah, it's bad...

[Weirdy]

why make such a big post about japanese being hostages in iraq for? there's thousands of other ppl that are hostages too

[veristic]

Those dirty bastards.

[Gryph]

why make such a big post about japanese being hostages in iraq for? there's thousands of other ppl that are hostages too

I think he thinks he's being helpful by posting such a long ass post.

 

The actual news reports on Reuters are shorter than that... Tatsuya, you need to get a taste of showmanship. To keep peoples' interest, you can't post such a long article and expect people to read it.

 

And Weirdanzeige, the only reason these 3 hostages are being shown instead of all the others is because Japan is an ally of American on the War on Terror (or Islam, those can be used interchangably), and it was Islamic militants that kidnapped them, so they had to show them so we'd hate them even more.

[Agozer]

That's all just politics wrapped in a "fancy" package.

[Tatsuya]

At the time all this was sitting on my desk the latest update hadn't come in.

 

And about the supposed release... why would you believe someone who would take hostages in the first place? Lets just wait and see if these people come back alive.

 

(This info was sent to me by a Japanese friend of mine)

Edited April 11, 2004 by Tatsuya

[Captain FuKu]

About the long post thing... yeah, well people nowadays have very very short attention span, so you gotta try and keep it short. LOL (Don't worry, it's not directed at anyone specifically, but just in general.)

 

But the way I see it is, whether it's long or not, if the topic interests the individual, they'll stick around and read it.

 

Anyhow, all this political talk just makes me feel suffocated and trapped. I'm currently taking a poli. science class and more and more it's been boring me to tears -- instructor just does not motivate me. :/ Frick! I'm also writing a paper for this class at the moment. Writing papers, exams, deadlines! Damn! They all make me feel suffocated and trapped!!

 

Sorry...

Edited April 11, 2004 by Captain FuKu

[random guy]

I know what you mean, cap'n. Right now I'm doing a political communication class, and even though I find the subject matter interesting, the lectures are just so BORING.

Man, I'd be terrified if I were the journalists who were shown the hostage at gunpoint.

The Iraq war is currently becoming the new Vietnam...except for that war it took years for the American people to realise the war was a mistake, but in this war many people knew all along, and the rest are beginning to realise already.

[Cominus]

They also captured a dude that works 3rd party for the army. Kind of like hired help by the armt except they dont fight they just do all the BG stuff like cook meals wash clothes and lots of other stuff, but it's sad cuz my aunt works for one of those companys and she was in iraq like a a week or a feew days ago but she's home now but she willl will eventually have to go back.