US negotiators are trying to secure the release in Iraq of hostage American journalist Jill Carroll as a deadline set by militants threatening to kill her passed with no word on her fate.
Muslims from Baghdad to Paris urged the militants to free the 28-year-old woman and end Iraq's wave of kidnappings. More than 240 foreigners have been taken captive and at least 39 killed since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein.
Carroll was seized in a rough Baghdad neighborhood on Jan. 7 by gunmen who killed her translator. The Sunni Arab politician she had gone to interview urged her release and demanded that US forces stop detaining Iraqi women.
"This act has hurt me and makes me sad because the journalist was trying to meet me when she was kidnapped," Adnan al-Dulaimi said yesterday. "I call upon the kidnappers to immediately release this reporter who came here to cover Iraq's news and defend our rights."
A videotape sent by Carroll's kidnappers, a group calling itself "The Revenge Brigade," was aired Tuesday by the Arab TV station Al-Jazeera, which said her captors threatened to kill her unless US forces freed all Iraqi women in military custody within 72 hours.
No hour was specified, and there was no indication if any prisoners had been released. But the US military confirmed Friday that it has nine Iraqi women in its detention facilities on suspicion of terror-related activities.
"We don't comment on whether Iraqi female or male detainees are in the process of being released," US military spokesman Lt. Col. Barry Johnson said. "Of course we understand the cultural sensitivities in detaining females and pay particular attention to assessing their files."
Iraq's deputy justice minister, Busho Ibrahim Ali, visited the women Friday and said six of them - three from Baghdad, and one each from Mosul, Kirkuk and Tal Afar - would be freed next week.