200 explosive belts seized in Iraq
(AP)Updated: 2007-07-12 10:27
A German woman who was kidnapped in Iraq was freed after 155 days in captivity, but her son is still being held. Hannelore Krause, 62, told Al-Arabiya television that her adult son, Sinan, would be killed if German troops do not leave Afghanistan.
"They kidnapped me and my son and we are German citizens," she said, speaking in German with Arabic voice-over. "I call on the Germans to leave Afghanistan and that the Germany army withdraw from Afghanistan. If they don't respond to this demand, my son will be slaughtered."
The mother and son, who disappeared Feb. 6, were shown twice in videos released by an insurgent group calling itself "Arrows of Righteousness." The group threatened to kill the hostages if Germany did not begin withdrawing its troops from Afghanistan within 10 days.
An Anglican priest who may have received a cryptic warning of recent failed car bombings in London and Glasgow has fled Iraq after threats against his life, an associate said.
Canon Andrew White, a British national who ran Iraq's only Anglican church, left Tuesday and returned to Britain, the associate said on condition of anonymity, saying the British Foreign Office had asked that it be the only source of information on the case.
The associate refused to elaborate on the threats. But the British Broadcasting Corp. Web site said pamphlets dropped in Shiite areas of Baghdad branded the vicar as "no more than a spy."
White had been working to secure the release of five British hostages who were seized at the Iraqi Finance Ministry on May 29 by gunmen wearing police uniforms.
White told The Associated Press that while in Amman, Jordan, in April, he had met a man identified by religious leaders as an al-Qaida leader. The man told him "Those who cure you will kill you."
White said in retrospect that may have been a warning of last month's failed plot to blow up car bombs in London and Scotland. Nearly all the suspects worked in medical professions.
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