INSURGENTS in war-ravaged Iraq have kidnapped more than 150 foreigners in their campaign to drive out coalition forces and hamper reconstruction.

Crack US troops made two failed attempts to rescue hostage Kenneth Bigley and the two Americans he was held captive with, it emerged today.

US warplanes struck twice in rebel-held Fallujah today, destroying a restaurant and a house said to be used by members of the terror group that beheaded Briton Ken Bigley.

AFTER a career spent working across the globe and a life punctuated with heartache, Kenneth Bigley hoped Iraq would be his last posting before he settled into happy retirement at a new home in Bangkok.

THE suffering of Kenneth Bigley’s Dublin-born mother was described last night by his cousin.

British hostage Ken Bigley has been killed by his captors in Iraq, Abu Dhabi television reported today.

Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi appealed today to kidnappers in Iraq to free hostage Kenneth Bigley.

The British government is ready to listen Ken Bigley’s kidnappers but will not enter into negotiations with them for the hostage’s release, Britain's Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said in Baghdad today.

There are reports from the Al-Jazeera television station that British hostage Ken Bigley has appeared in a new video tape.

PALESTINIAN leader Yasser Arafat has pledged his support to efforts to release Briton Ken Bigley, the hostage’s brother Paul said last night.

US aircraft blasted the rebel stronghold of Fallujah three times in 24 hours over the weekend in a concerted effort to hit militants loyal to guerrilla chief Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

American troops have arrested a senior commander of the US-trained Iraqi National Guard for alleged ties to insurgents.

Lil Bigley, the 86-year-old mother of captive Ken Bigley, was taken to hospital again this afternoon.

THE images coming out of the latest hostage crisis in Iraq - capped by dramatic video of British captive Kenneth Bigley begging for his life - have transfixed Britons, left governments looking helpless and revived a classic dilemma about whether to negotiate with terrorists.

THE British and Iraqi governments said yesterday they would not bow to the demands of militants threatening to kill a British hostage, despite a video message from the captive pleading for his life.

The wife of British hostage Ken Bigley, who is being held in Iraq, made an emotional plea to his kidnappers for mercy today after two of his American colleagues were beheaded.

A British hostage appeared on a video posted on an Islamic website weeping and pleading for his life as Iraq’s leader and US officials stifled reports a high-profile female Iraqi weapons scientist could be released from jail soon - as demanded by his captors.

The spiritual leader of the terror group believed to have killed two American hostages in Iraq this week and responsible for a string of other deadly attacks has been killed in a US air strike, his family and Islamic clerics said yesterday.

A videotape posted on Islamic website tonight purportedly showed a man who identified himself as British hostage Kenneth Bigley pleading for Prime Minister Tony Blair to help save his life.

British hostage Kenneth Bigley’s life was tonight in the blood-stained hands of a terrorist who has severed the heads of two other captives.

Two high-profile women prisoners in American custody will not be released immediately, the US embassy said in Baghdad despite an earlier announcement by Iraqi authorities.

A headless corpse was found in Baghdad today hours after an al-Qaida-linked group boasted it had killed a second American hostage, leaving the Briton they are holding to face execution.

There was reportedly a glimmer of hope for the distraught family of British hostage Kenneth Bigley when Iraq’s justice minister pledged to release one of the two Iraqi women in custody - a partial concession to the kidnappers’ demands.

Al-Jazeera television has cited a website claim that a second US hostage has been killed.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair spoke to the family of Iraq hostage Kenneth Bigley this afternoon, Downing Street said.

The militant group led by al-Qaida ally Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has posted a gruesome video on a website showing the decapitation of a man identified as American civil engineer Eugene Armstrong.

A VIDEO posted on a website last night showed the apparent beheading of American construction contractor Eugene Armstrong, said to have been carried out personally by key Iraq terror suspect Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

Iraqi kidnappers tonight beheaded an American on video – but said two more Western hostages, including British man Kenneth Bigley, would have the deadline for their executions delayed by 24 hours.

An American hostage being held in Iraq has been beheaded, according to a statement by the group holding three Westerners.

The brother of a British hostage in Iraq have appealed for his release on pan-Arab satellite television.