Militants holding UN hostages set Friday deadline

KABUL – Militants threatening to kill three foreign hostages in Afghanistan said they would give officials until Friday to meet their demands that the United Nations withdraw from the country and the US releases Guantanamo Bay prisoners, and warned that any rescue attempt would end in bloodshed.

One day after the three UN workers were shown pleading for freedom in an Iraq-style video, the Taliban splinter group claiming to hold them said yesterday it had split the trio up to thwart any move by authorities to save them. “That’s our strategy,” Ishaq Manzoor, a spokesman for the group, told The Associated Press in a satellite telephone call.”If the government and coalition forces find one of them, we will kill the other two.”Afghan security officials say they have had no contact with the kidnappers, who abducted the three – Annetta Flanigan of Northern Ireland, Filipino diplomat Angelito Nayan and Shqipe Habibi of Kosovo – from a UN vehicle at gunpoint in the capital on Thursday.But Manzoor insisted that a businessman was carrying messages between the militants and the Afghan government and the United Nations.He declined to elaborate.On Sunday, the spokesman had suggested that the group, called Jaish-al Muslimeen, or Army of Muslims, would start killing the hostages on Wednesday if its demands were not met.The group also insists that Britain withdraw its troops from Afghanistan, and that the United States release all of its Muslim prisoners from Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.But on Monday he told AP that “we will wait until Friday for the response of the government and the UN.After that, we will do what we have said we will do”.UN spokesman Manoel de Almeida e Silva declined to comment on whether contact had been established.- Nampa-AP”That’s our strategy,” Ishaq Manzoor, a spokesman for the group, told The Associated Press in a satellite telephone call.”If the government and coalition forces find one of them, we will kill the other two.”Afghan security officials say they have had no contact with the kidnappers, who abducted the three – Annetta Flanigan of Northern Ireland, Filipino diplomat Angelito Nayan and Shqipe Habibi of Kosovo – from a UN vehicle at gunpoint in the capital on Thursday.But Manzoor insisted that a businessman was carrying messages between the militants and the Afghan government and the United Nations.He declined to elaborate.On Sunday, the spokesman had suggested that the group, called Jaish-al Muslimeen, or Army of Muslims, would start killing the hostages on Wednesday if its demands were not met.The group also insists that Britain withdraw its troops from Afghanistan, and that the United States release all of its Muslim prisoners from Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.But on Monday he told AP that “we will wait until Friday for the response of the government and the UN.After that, we will do what we have said we will do”.UN spokesman Manoel de Almeida e Silva declined to comment on whether contact had been established.- Nampa-AP