The Filipino hostage in Iraq threatened with beheading was still alive on Tuesday, the Iraqi government said, as the Philippines gave mixed signals about whether it would withdraw its forces early to meet the kidnappers’ demands.
As the new government grapples with a continuing insurgency two weeks after it took over from the United States-led coalition, a deadly gunbattle erupted in the northern city of Mosul.
The Iraqi police, meanwhile, arrested 500 suspected criminals in Baghdad.
And following on from the revival on Monday of diplomatic relations between France and Iraq after a 13-year hiatus, the United Nations appointed a new representative to the country.
In Brussels, Iraq’s Foreign Minister Hoyshar Zebari appealed to Nato to launch a training program for the nations’s fledgling army as soon as possible.
With time slipping away, the interior ministry said a Filipino hostage, as well as two Bulgarian hostages, had not yet been executed as insurgents dangled the captives’ lives as bargaining chips in a high-stakes political game.
”They are still alive,” said Colonel Adnan Abdul Rhaman, the interior ministry’s chief spokesman.
In Manila, the Philippines denied it was planning an early withdrawal of troops to save kidnapped truck driver Angelo de la Cruz despite a suggestion by Deputy Foreign Secretary Rafael Seguis that the process could be speeded up.
”We maintain the same position,” said a senior official in Manila. ”Until all the preparations are completed, that is the only time they are pulling out.”
The kidnappers from the Khaled ibn al-Walid Brigade (Islamic Army in Iraq) have demanded Manila pull out the 51 troops by July 20, one month ahead of schedule. They have threatened to behead the hostage if the demand is not met.
The hostage’s wife and brother were nervously waiting in neighbouring Jordan as negotiators tried on Tuesday to secure his freedom.
In addition to the Filipino, a second group of kidnappers, linked to Al-Qaeda, have threatened to behead two Bulgarian truck drivers unless US troops freed Iraqi prisoners within 24 hours.
There are also concerns for the fate of an Egyptian hostage whose kidnappers are demanding a $1-million ransom.
Iraq’s interim President Sheikh Ghazi al-Yawar vowed to crack down on the insurgents on Monday while offering them amnesty if they turned themselves in.
It is ”the last chance for the terrorist, the hostage taker and the criminal, after that there is only the sword and rest assured that we will cut them out from their roots,” he said.
The new government is fearful that any concession to kidnappers could encourage more hostage-takings by insurgents seeking to further destabilise the country and force foreign nations to pull out their troops.
In a show of resolve, Iraq’s interior ministry said it was implementing a plan to halt the daily crimes that plague Baghdad.
Kicking off the campaign, Iraqi police pulled off their largest haul since the US-led invasion, netting 500 suspected murderers, kidnappers and thieves in Monday, officials said on Tuesday.
But in Mosul, an Iraqi National Guard and at least one insurgent were killed and more than a dozen wounded in a gunbattle.
In the northern oil city of Kirkuk, the US military said it captured 12 members of the radical group Ansar al-Islam, while the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan said its security forces had captured another five members of the militant faction.
Meanwhile, Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States, Ashraf Jehangir Qazi, was named as the new UN envoy to Iraq, replacing Sergio Vieira de Mello who was among 22 people killed in a bomb attack on the UN headquarters in Baghdad last August.
But it is unclear when Qazi will take up his post in the Iraqi capital due to the uncertain security situation more than a year after the US-led war toppled Saddam Hussein.
A new public opinion poll found that almost two-thirds of Iraqis oppose the presence of the US-led military in their country, but many fear their departure would lead to even greater violence.
The survey by the private Iraq Centre for Research and Strategic Studies reflected once more Iraq’s contradictory feelings about US troops and the precarious security situation across the country.
Sixty-six percent of those surveyed said they are opposed to the multinational forces. But only 41% said they would feel more secure if they departed. — Sapa-AFP