Merkel presses for release of Iraq hostage

Chancellor Angela Merkel and other leading German figures today pressed for the release of an aid worker kidnapped in Iraq more than a week ago, while the government continued trying to establish contact with her captors.

“We appeal to the perpetrators to release the captives without delay,” Merkel said in an appeal published by the Bild am Sonntag newspaper. She said the government “is doing everything it can to save the lives of Susanne Osthoff and her companion,” an Iraqi driver.