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(Photos: Xinhua/AFP)
¡¡¡¡LONDON, Sept. 29 (Xinhuanet) -- British hostage Kenneth Bigley appeared in
a video tape aired on Wednesday, pleading with Prime Minister Tony Blair to meet
the demands of his captors and release women prisoners in Iraq.
¡¡¡¡Kenneth Bigley, captured on Sept. 16 in Baghdad, was shown on Arab TV
channel al-Jazeera crouching behind bars wearing an orangejumpsuit.
¡¡¡¡Kenneth said in the video that "Tony Blair is lying. He doesn't care about
me. I'm just one person," according to the BBC.
¡¡¡¡He said his captors did not want to kill him.
¡¡¡¡Earlier, Blair said at the Labor Party conference in Brighton, South
England, that efforts were being made to establish links with the kidnappers.
¡¡¡¡The British government is trying to make contact with that particular
group, but the difficulty is that they are not Iraqis, said Blair.
¡¡¡¡On Wednesday morning, Kenneth's brother Paul Bigley said he wasupbeat about
the possibility of his release after he had received a message that suggested
Kenneth's release.
¡¡¡¡A communique was posted on Tuesday night on the Arabic-languagewebsite
, in the name of the Tawhid and Jihad groupof Abu Musab
al-Zarqawi, which kidnapped Kenneth.
¡¡¡¡"I believe it is true and we are hoping and waiting to see whathappens
now," he told the Independent Television News after he received a written
translation of the statement.
¡¡¡¡The British government could not confirm the report and was trying to
authenticate the message while making efforts to releasethe hostage, a
spokesperson for the Foreign Office told Xinhua.
¡¡¡¡Analysts urged caution over the report, pointing out that otherclaims made
on Islamic websites turned out to be completely false.Enditem
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