Muslim council team heads to Iraq

[DVTimes]

The Muslim Council of Britain has said it is sending representatives to Iraq to try to secure the release of British hostage Ken Bigley.
There has been no word from Mr Bigley's captors since Wednesday.

The council's team will fly out to Iraq as soon as possible and try to start a dialogue with the captors.

More than 50,000 pamphlets pleading for information about Mr Bigley's whereabouts have also been handed out in Baghdad's Mansour district.

The leaflets, with a personal appeal from the 62-year-old engineer's family, were released by the UK Foreign Office on Thursday night.

Baghdad's western Mansour area was where Mr Bigley and two colleagues were taken captive.

The three were seized at gunpoint and Americans Eugene Armstrong and Jack Hensley have since been beheaded.

Following a series of appeals from Mr Bigley's family to the kidnappers, the MCB said it was sending out two representatives "very shortly".

Spokesman Inayat Bunglawala said the pair would meet with senior Iraqi leaders and religious figures "with a view to appealing them to do all they can to help secure the release of this innocent man back into the arms of his waiting family".

He said the group had the full support of the Foreign Office.

'Worldwide commotion'

Mr Bigley's brother Paul has told the BBC he is convinced the kidnappers have been following the family's high-profile campaign to free him.

"I'm absolutely convinced the people holding Ken have had sight of my messages," he said.

"They know only too well what commotion we've caused worldwide."

On Friday Foreign Secretary Jack Straw again telephoned the Bigley family to update them on the situation.

Written in Arabic, leaflets dropped in Baghdad on Thursday night read: "This is a personal appeal from a family whose son is missing.

"A family man called Ken Bigley is being held somewhere in your community.

"We are Ken's family. Ken's mother, brothers, wife and child love him dearly.

"We are appealing for your help. We appeal to those who have taken him to return Ken to us.

"Do you know where Ken is? Do you have any information about his whereabouts?"

'Show mercy'

On Thursday, Mr Bigley's mother Lil, 86, made a televised appeal for her son from her home city of Liverpool.

"Would you please help my son? He is only a working man who wants to support his family. Please show mercy to Ken and send him home to me alive," she said.

She fell ill after making the statement and was taken to hospital, but later returned home.

Mr Bigley's wife Sombat, who lives in Thailand and has been married to him for seven years, has also made a appeal, begging for him to be freed.


In Baghdad on Thursday night armed men kidnapped two Egyptians from their Baghdad office, the third such abduction in less than three weeks.

Kidnappers from the Tawhid and Jihad Group, led by al-Qaeda suspect Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, have threatened to murder Mr Bigley unless the UK and US release all women held in Iraqi jails.

A film of Mr Bigley pleading to Prime Minister Tony Blair to save his life was posted on an Islamic website.

But Britain has ruled out negotiating with the kidnappers, and the US says it will not allow the release of the woman scientist Dr Rihab Rashid Taha being held in Iraq.

Leaders of all faiths, and people who want to show their support, will be attending a candle-lit vigil at Liverpool's Catholic Cathedral on Friday from 2100 BST.

Leaders of Liverpool's Muslim community have condemned the murders and kidnappings as "completely and utterly un-Islamic".


http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3688076.stm

[donnie]

This is crazy. I hope they let him go.

But why would they show mercy??? Are USA and UK showing mercy when they drop cluster bombs all over Iraq????