Blair refuses to bow to demands despite pleas
The kidnappers say they will behead Kenneth Bigley unless all Iraqi women are freed from US-run jails.
After a day of confusion on Wednesday over whether one of two Iraqi women in US custody would be freed, the interim Iraqi government said in a statement that Prime Minister Iyad Allawi was not willing to allow her release.
“The government renews its call on the terrorists to release Kenneth Bigley forthwith and without condition,” it said.
In a speech to the US Congress in Washington, Mr Allawi yesterday reiterated his belief that Iraq’s fledgling security forces would prevail against the insurgents, as well as the widespread violence which threatens elections scheduled for January.
“In Iraq, we confront both an insurgency and the global war on terror, with their destructive forces sometimes overlapping,” he said. “I can tell you today they will not succeed.”
Last Thursday, Mr Bigley and Americans Eugene Armstrong and Jack Hensley were seized by gunmen in Baghdad.
The Tawhid and Jihad group led by Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi says it killed Mr Armstrong and Mr Hensley because the US military rejected its demand to free all Iraqi women from US-run prisons in Iraq.
In a video made public on Wednesday, Mr Bigley appealed to British Prime Minister Tony Blair to intervene and meet his kidnappers’ demands. “I think this is possibly my last chance,” he said. “I don’t want to die.”
Mr Bigley’s brother, Paul, accused the US of wrecking efforts to save his brother’s life after US officials and Mr Allawi quickly quashed a comment by an Iraqi official saying that one of the female prisoners would be freed yesterday.
“That was a shadow of light in a big, long, dark, damp, filthy, cold tunnel. Now this has been sabotaged,” Paul Bigley told the BBC yesterday.
Mr Bigley’s Thai wife, Sombat, begged to be reunited with her beloved “ordinary, hard-working, family man”.
She said she had seen the footage of her sobbing husband, and added: “We have been married for seven years and I love him very much ... I desperately want to be reunited with my husband.
“I plead for your mercy now and beg that you release Ken so that I may be with him again.”
In a video released on Wednesday night, a clearly terrified Mr Bigley said: “I don’t want to die.
“Please help them, I need you to help, Mr Blair. You are now the only person on God’s Earth that I can speak to.”
Often breaking down, he went on: “Please, please help me to see my wife who cannot go on without me. She really can’t. And my son. Please help me ... please help me.”
Mr Blair last night spoke to Mr Bigley’s family for a second time.
He phoned the family the day after the video plea was released. Downing Street said he called the family in Liverpool at 5pm but would not discuss what was said.
It is the second time Mr Blair has spoken to the family after phoning them on Tuesday and he no doubt stressed again that his government was doing everything possible to secure the engineer’s safe release.
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