Posted on 09/06/2004 6:41:09 PM PDT by NCjim
A statement purportedly from the Islamic Army of Iraq (news - web sites) posted on an Islamist website gave France 48 hours to accept three new conditions for the release of Christian Chesnot and Georges Malbrunot: agreeing to a recent truce offer by Osama bin Laden (news - web sites), payment of five million dollars ransom and a pledge not to get involved in Iraq.
But French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin expressed skepticism over the alleged new demands, saying they had yet to be authenticated.
Raffarin told RTL radio that French authorities "always take this kind of information seriously" but added: "The claims have been met with a lot of skepticism from experts."
"We are trying to verify the validity of these claims. For the moment, that has not happened," the prime minister said at the start of a debate with opposition Socialist leader Francois Hollande.
"Today, nothing brings into question the confidence we have about achieving a positive outcome" to the hostage drama, Raffarin said, urging continued caution.
Chesnot, 37, of Radio France Internationale, Malbrunot, 41, of the daily Le Figaro and their Syrian driver were taken hostage on August 20 by the Islamic Army of Iraq, which demanded that France rescind a ban on Islamic headscarves in state schools.
Paris refused to back down, mobilizing an unprecedented campaign of support for the two journalists in the Arab world and bringing the headscarf law into effect as planned on Thursday with the start of the school year.
In Pristina meanwhile, on a visit to Kosovo, French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier said he was confident of a positive outcome.
"As I speak to you now I believe there is a possibility for a positive solution," he told a news conference. But he also reiterated that France was working with extreme caution.
Barnier, who had hoped to secure the release of the journalists during a trip to the Middle East last week, declined to comment on the demand for five million dollars (4.15 million euros) from a group that had previously expressed political demands.
"There are a lot of rumours going around but I will not comment no them. We continue to work with caution, prudence and discretion for the security of the journalists and their release," he said.
European leaders have already dismissed the supposed Al-Qaeda truce offer made by bin Laden in April, which promised no attacks in European countries that refrained from attacks against Muslims and pulled their troops out of the Islamic world within three months.
A senior cleric from the strict Wahhabi current of Islam in Iraq on Sunday issued a fatwa (Islamic decree) demanding the captors of the two French reporters free them immediately.
But Sheikh Mehdi al-Sumaidaie, an influential figure among the extremist Sunni organizations responsible for the bulk of kidnappings in Iraq lately, also lambasted the Iraqi government and US forces for staging a raid Saturday in Latifiya in the area where the pair was kidnapped, saying it had harmed efforts for their release.
"The attack on Latifiya disrupted the process of their release," he said.
Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari reiterated on Monday the US-backed interim government's willingness to help secure the release of Chesnot and Malbrunot.
"The Iraqi government is willing and ready to provide the French government with everything possible to help it free the hostages and return them safely to their families and their homes," Zebari told a news conference in the Jordanian capital Amman.
He said the government had made no statements about the hostages to avoid complicating talks for the release.
"We did not want to interfere in a very delicate subject while negotiations were under way between the French government and the kidnappers or other parties," said Zebari.
Le France is slow on the uptake. Oui?
They're so nuanced.
french hostages
wonder why kerry has not tried to have his brethren freed.
"A senior cleric from the strict Wahhabi current of Islam in Iraq on Sunday issued a fatwa (Islamic decree) demanding the captors of the two French reporters free them immediately. "
Funny how we don't have any "senior clerics" here issuing fatwas demanding the insurgets in Iraq lay down their arms -
There must be some rule of the " radius of fatwas " so these "laws" only apply to a certain distance depending on the status of the cleric.
I guess that Bin Laden already considers Chechnya part of the Islamic world!
France is acting like the town mayor in the movie "Red Dawn." You cannot rationally deal with an irrational opponant. The only way is to either exterminate them until one rises from the ashes that is rational.
> There must be some rule of the " radius of fatwas "
> so these "laws" only apply to a certain distance
> depending on the status of the cleric.
Forum shopping. No radius limit. When cutthroat cultists
don't like what one cleric tells 'em, they keep looking.
Islam has no pope (except maybe bin Laden), and this is
seen as a problem by people who want to bring the
radicalism under control short of obliterating entirely
this 8th century delusion.
There may be no other choice, ultimately.
We had to wipe out the Cult of Thugee, too.
"...while negotiations were under way between the French government and the kidnappers..."
There's your trouble.
I do not wish these reporters any harm, but the fact that they are relying on the French Government for their safety, sure doesn't bode well for them... :(
Once they are authenticated, however, negotiation can begin in earnest.
Because he's loathe to mention the "T-word".
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