Bob Fowler Kidnapped in Niger (Dec 2008-Apr 2009)

[dapaterson]

The UN has a Personal Security department, I'd expect some of them, plus a few political wonks.  Quality varies...

Between horrible and very poor...

 

[dapaterson]

And here I thought I was being an optimist...

 

[leroi]

I haven't seen much in the way of follow-up news on this but, it appears, the three are still missing:

http://www.embassymag.ca/page/view/chatter-1-7-2009

Diplomat Bob Fowler Still at Large Weeks After Disappearance in Niger
by Jeff Davis   

Published January 7 2009   

It has now been twenty-four days since Canadian diplomats Robert Fowler and Louis Guay went missing in Niger, and it seems Canadian and international authorities are far from repatriating the two.

Mr. Fowler, the UN secretary-general's special envoy to Niger, and Mr. Guay, the deputy director of DFAIT's Sudan task force, and their locally-engaged driver were last seen on Dec. 14. The two disappeared while driving back from a visit to a gold mine operated by Canadian company Semafo.

The fact that their truck, which bore UN markings, as well as their telephones were left on the scene has led investigators to believe they were kidnapped.

In an interview with Embassy, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon's spokesman Farhan Haq said: "At this stage we don't have any solid information" on the whereabouts of the two.

He said no proof of life has been received, and no groups have claimed responsibility for the presumed kidnapping.

Mr. Haq also said no authorities or individuals have received any sort of communication from the missing men, adding: "We don't know where he might be."

He said UN and Canadian authorities have been working with authorities across the region, and that both UN and Canadian authorities are now investigating on the ground. "I believe there is RMCP involvement in this," said Mr. Haq.

Whereas the UN offices readily provided the facts, neither the office of Foreign Minister Lawrence Cannon nor DFAIT communications staff would release any information on the case. "DFAIT will not comment or release any information which may compromise efforts and jeopardize the safety of Canadians or other citizens," said one spokeswoman.

It is not known whether the Canadians are still in Niger, though there is some reason to believe they could now be in neighbouring Mali. Word is that Bill Crosbie, the assistant deputy minister for consular services, has travelled to Mali. In addition, news service Agence France-Presse has reported that Canada has asked authorities in Mali for their co-operation.

"Canada has asked Mali's help and support to help the search for its two lost diplomats," a Malian diplomatic source told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity. "We responded that we would do everything to help Canada, a friendly nation."

 

[Danjanou]

I wonder what comprises that team.

 

[Edward Campbell]

And here, reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the Copyright Act from the Globe and Mail web site, is another report that says, “nothing to report:”
--------------------
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20090108.wfowler08/BNStory/International/home

No ransom demand made for diplomats

CAMPBELL CLARK

From Thursday's Globe and Mail
January 8, 2009 at 4:28 AM EST

OTTAWA — No ransom demand has been made for two Canadian diplomats who vanished while on a high-level UN mission in the West African nation of Niger, Foreign Affairs Minister Lawrence Cannon said yesterday.

Robert Fowler and Louis Guay have been missing since Dec. 14, but no group has come forward to say they abducted the pair for political ends or to demand money in return for their release, according to Canadian and UN officials.

"No, we haven't had any ransom demands to that effect," Mr. Cannon said.

The Foreign Affairs Minister said he considers their abduction a "major concern" and that he has twice spoken to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon about it.

UN spokesman Farhan Haq said no group has come forward to claim responsibility, although he said UN officials are trying to pursue some leads.

Mr. Fowler, a highly respected retired diplomat for Canada, was quietly appointed last summer as UN special envoy to Niger to explore the possibility of peace talks between the government of President Mamadou Tandja and Tuareg rebel groups in the north.

He disappeared Dec. 14 along with Mr. Guay, a senior Canadian diplomat, and their driver from Niger. Their car was found on the road about 40 kilometres from the capital, Niamey, with the engine running. They were returning from a visit to a mine operated by a Canadian company.

An offshoot rebel group, the Front des Forces de Redressement, briefly claimed responsibility, but later denied involvement.
--------------------

I have very little to zero faith in the investigative capabilities of DFAIT and the UN and even less in their abilities to actually do anything. I also fear that the people who might be able to go and find Mr. Fowler are unprepared to operate in Niger right now.

Not encouraging.

 

[Old Sweat]

There also been some speculation in the press that they may have taken to Mali. However, others have hinted that the Niger government may have had a hand in it, although the reason and the reasoning behind the theory are not clear.

 

[Old Sweat]

The president of Niger is blaming "terrorist groups" here:

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5jCzz1y9XN6gPYUnBOzzSKZClDNog

 

[riggermade]

Seems to me that very little is being reported on this.  Good or bad, waits to be seen, maybe with little news coverage they get released

 

[leroi]

I'm posting this here because it seems like the same M.O. as the Fowler kidnapping:

http://www.canada.com/topics/news/world/story.html?id=1206896

4 European Tourists Kidnapped in Niger

Agence France-Presse
Published: Thursday, January 22, 2009

BAMAKO - Unknown assailants kidnapped a group of European tourists on Thursday, including two Swiss, one German and a Briton, in Niger near the Malian border, a regional governor in Mali said.

"We just finished the latest verification and there are a total of four European tourists kidnapped on Niger's territory close to the border with Mali: one German national, one British national and two Swiss nationals," General Amadou Baba Toure, governor of Gao province, told AFP.

Robert Fowler, the UN envoy to Niger, disappeared along with his assistant and their driver on the way back from a visit to a gold mine operated by Canadian company Semafo, west of Niamey.

The group had been returning from a festival of nomad culture at Anderamboukane, on the border between Mali and Niger, when they were seized, the Malian authorities said.

A source in the Malian security forces confirmed the kidnapping, adding that it took place at Bani-Bangou, 60 kilometres from the border with Mali.

Germany's foreign ministry confirmed it had received information that a German woman had disappeared in Mali.

"The foreign ministry and the (German) embassy in Bamako are following information that a German woman disappeared today in the middle of the day in Mali," a ministry spokesman told AFP.

"They are trying to shed light on what happened."

In London, Britain's foreign ministry said it had heard the reports of the kidnapping but could not confirm British nationals were involved.

The north of Mali has been the scene of violent clashes between Tuareg rebel groups and the Malian army in recent years.

The Tuaregs are a nomadic desert people who have roamed the southern Sahara for centuries. In recent years they have staged uprisings in both Mali and Niger, claiming autonomy for their traditional homeland.

Two Canadian diplomats, one of them the United Nations envoy to Niger, disappeared in Niger in early December and are presumed kidnapped.

The car UN envoy Robert Fowler and his assistant Louis Guay were travelling in was discovered on December 15 at the side of the road in an apparently trouble-free area close to the capital Niamey. It's engine was running and the vehicle's doors were wide open.

Last week Niger's President Mamadou Tandja said the diplomats were being held by terrorist groups.

"All the investigations undertaken indicate they are being held hostage by terrorist groups," Tanja said, referring to Tuareg rebel groups operating in the north of the country.

© Agence France-Press

 

[leroi]

More speculation and possible links to a-Q:

Abducted Without a Trace

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20090123.wfowler0123/BNStory/International/home


GEOFFREY YORK
Globe and Mail Update: Reproduced under Fair Dealing provisions of the Copyright Act
January 24, 2009 at 1:04 AM EST

KARMA, Niger —

In an empty expanse of blazing hot scrubland, the last remaining sign of the abducted Canadians is the scraped surface of the desert, where investigators used a bulldozer to remove a layer of the rocky red soil to search for clues.


Now the police have abandoned the site, and silence hangs over the spot where Robert Fowler and Louis Guay vanished into the twilight of western Niger six weeks ago. There is only a passing donkey cart and an occasional herd of goats, standing on their hind legs to reach the leaves of the thorn trees.


The harmattan — the wind from the Sahara — fills the sky with dust, gradually obliterating the final traces of the abduction.


Mr. Fowler, 64, was one of Ottawa's most powerful bureaucrats before his retirement. He had served as an ambassador to the United Nations, a deputy minister of defence, a top adviser to a string of prime ministers and a veteran of war zones from Rwanda to Darfur. Yet this time he may have ventured a step too far.


The tale of the vanished Canadians has all the elements of a Graham Greene thriller: the secretive diplomats who concealed their true mission, their mysterious disappearance in an obscure African country, the intricate games of the rebels and the government and the foreign investigators who are struggling to understand it all.


But if this is a Graham Greene mystery, it has a 21st-century twist: The Islamic radicals with ties to al-Qaeda who investigators believe may now be holding the diplomats. The radicals have emerged as a growing power in North Africa and now seem to be expanding into countries such as Mali and Niger — a vast new territory for their ambitions.


SPIRITED INTO DESERT


The captors weren't lacking in confidence. The site is within several kilometres of a military base and a high-security prison, just 15 minutes past a police checkpoint on the outskirts of Niger's capital, Niamey. The diplomats were snatched almost under the noses of the police and the military.


The impoverished farmers who live in thatched huts down the road are afraid to talk about what happened. They saw the police and soldiers searching the desert for two days, and they know about the interrogations and arrests of innocent local residents. They prefer to say nothing.


"We don't want to go to Koutoukale," says one woman, referring to the nearby prison where a former prime minister is already jailed. "The military patrols and the gendarmerie were here for two days. They asked us if we knew anything about the two missing foreigners, but we didn't know anything. They asked us if we'd had any visitors on those days, but we hadn't."


The abduction was an audacious coup. Just as the sun was setting on Dec. 14, the abductors pulled over the United Nations jeep. They grabbed Mr. Fowler and his Canadian aide, Mr. Guay, along with their UN driver, and spirited them into the desert, leaving their vehicle with the motor running. Six weeks later, no one has found a trace of them.


The leading theory among investigators, according to government sources, is that the Canadians are in the hands of a radical Islamic group with links to al-Qaeda. They may have been sold or traded to the Islamic militants by Tuareg nomads who captured the men for profit without realizing the full value of Mr. Fowler, a special envoy who was appointed to one of the highest ranks in the UN system.


The investigators — a joint force of Canadian, American and UN security experts and intelligence agencies — believe that the captors succeeded in whisking the diplomats out of Niger and into a remote no man's land on the margins of the Sahara, probably in neighbouring Mali or Algeria, where borders are porous and the authorities have little control. It is there, in an isolated desert stronghold, where the two Canadians may still be held.


The theory of a Tuareg-Islamic connection has become stronger since the capture of four European tourists in Mali this week near the Niger border and less than 250 kilometres from where the Canadians were abducted. The deserts of Mali and Niger are dominated by the blue-turbaned Tuareg people who roam across the Sahara, one of the harshest landscapes on Earth. Anti-terrorism officials have concluded that there are "opportunistic links" between Tuareg rebels and the Islamic radicals.


Continued on Page 2…

Page 1 of 3

 

[George Wallace]

Reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the Copyright Act:

Evidence suggests Fowler is alive: UN diplomat
By Steven Edwards, Canwest News Service        January 30, 2009

UNITED NATIONS — Evidence has emerged suggesting Robert Fowler — the Canadian United Nations envoy who disappeared last month in Niger with his Canadian assistant and locally hired driver — is alive, a UN Security Council diplomat said Friday.

Hope remains that Louis Guay, the Foreign Affairs official who accompanied Fowler to the West African country, and their driver Soumana Mounkaila of Niger are also alive, officials said.

The trio disappeared Dec. 14 as they returned to the Niger capital of Niamey after visiting a Canadian-run gold mine in the western part of the country — and no word has emerged publicly about their fate until now.

“There has been evidence some days ago that he was alive,” the Security Council diplomat said of Fowler. “All these issues are very complicated.”

The diplomat did not want to be identified.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon spoke privately late last week with Fowler’s wife, Mary, and “reiterated that we’re doing all that we can to locate the missing men,” said Farhan Haq, a UN spokesman.

Speculation has been increasingly focused on the possibility that operatives with — or connected to — the extremist group al-Qaida in Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) had come to hold the trio.

The involvement in the search for the men of U.S. intelligence officials also suggested that suspicion focused on an internationally active group like AQIM.

“I didn’t know that people thought he wasn’t alive,” said one intelligence officer Friday.

AQIM’s involvement appeared increasingly likely following the abduction last week of four European tourists in the northeast part of Mali, close to the Niger border. Mali is where the extremist group last year held two Austrian tourists they’d abducted in Tunisia in February before releasing them in October after demanding an $8-million ransom payment.

The kidnappers of the four Europeans did so in a manner that was similar to that suggested by evidence left at the scene where Fowler and his colleagues disappeared about 45 kilometres northeast of Niamey.

The kidnappers of the Europeans abandoned the tourists’ two all-terrain vehicles and released one of their local tour-guide drivers after beating him — while a third all-terrain vehicle containing three other tourists and their driver escaped.

Similarly, the UN-marked vehicle carrying Fowler, Guay and Mounkaila was also abandoned with personal effects such as cellphones left inside.

Retired from the Canadian diplomatic corps, Fowler, a father of four, was the longest serving Canadian ambassador to the UN, is a former deputy defence minister, and has advised several prime ministers. Guay, a father of five, had worked most recently on the Sudan desk at the Department of Foreign Affairs.

Some early speculation suggested the Niger government might have been behind their disappearance because it had been unhappy about his reason for visiting the country as a UN envoy.

However, the government is also considered by experts to be one of the more responsible on the continent as it searches for foreign investment, while observers also pointed out it would have no incentive to abduct tourists.

Ban had dispatched Fowler on what was described as an “exploratory” peace mission against the backdrop of rising conflict between the Niger government and rebels of the Tuareg people in the north of the country.

The Niger government opposes any talks with the rebels, whom it describes as bandits, but nevertheless permitted Fowler and Guay to travel to the country.

The government itself, meanwhile, has pointed the finger at the Tuareg rebels, who are demanding up to 30 per cent of revenues from uranium mining being conducted in the north.

A splinter group of one of the main rebel armies at first claimed responsibility for the men’s disappearance, then denied any involvement.

© Copyright (c) Canwest News Service


LINK

 

[old medic]

Canadian diplomats missing in Niger spotted: AFP
Feb. 7 2009
The Canadian Press article - copy at http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20090207/envoy_missing_090207/20090207?hub=TopStories

A media report is citing unnamed sources in west Africa who say they have viewed a video depicting two Canadian diplomats who vanished last year in Niger.

News service Agence-France Press says the purported recording of United Nations envoy Robert Fowler, 64, and his assistant, Louis Guay, has been turned over to Canadian authorities.

Fowler, Guay and their driver Soumana Moukaila disappeared in mid-December when returning from a visit to a gold mine.

AFP describes the sources as close to the investigation and quotes a local leader from north Mali, west of Niger, as saying the video shows the two diplomats introducing themselves.

Another Malian source who claims to have seen the tape says there are armed men in the background and that Fowler "asks for a response to the demands of his kidnappers but doesn't provide any more details."

AFP quotes the source as saying the undated video lasts several minutes and that it shows Guay looking "dejected."

The two Canadians and their driver have been missing since Dec. 14, when their car was found about 35 kilometres from the Niger capital, Niamey, with its engine running and cellphones and a camera inside.

In the country's first formal acknowledgment of the disappearance, the president of Niger said last month the trio had been kidnapped by rebels.

"All of our investigations lead us to believe that he was taken hostage by this terrorist group and their accomplices," said President Mamadou Tandja.

Fowler was on assignment as the UN's special envoy to Niger when the trio disappeared Dec. 14.

Their car was found abandoned about 50 kilometres northeast of Niamey, Niger's capital.

The website of a splinter group of Tuareg rebels, the Front des Forces de Redressement, initially posted a claim of responsibility, but that was quickly denied by the faction's leader.

 

[The Bread Guy]

Link to Agence France-Presse's version - pdf attached if link doesn't work - shared with the usual disclaimer....

Canada has received a videocassette as proof that two of its diplomats kidnapped in Niger in mid-December are still alive, sources close to the investigation in Mali said Saturday.

"In the cassette, we see the two Canadian diplomats appear before the camera in turn to introduce themselves", a local elder from northern Mali who has seen the video told AFP.

The diplomats, UN envoy to Niger Robert Fowler and Louis Guay, and their driver went missing in mid-December when returning from a visit to a gold mine operated by Canadian company Semafo, west of Niamey in Niger.

Another Malian source who saw the video said it confirms the two diplomats are alive.

"It is Robert Fowler who appears first before the camera. Behind him there are armed men. Mr Fowler asks for a response to the demands of his kidnappers but doesn't provide any more details", said the source.

In the undated video that lasts several minutes Guay "looks dejected", the source said.

They said the driver of the two diplomats, Soumana Moukaila, did not appear in the video..../quote]

 

[the 48th regulator]

Reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the Copyright Act

Al-Qaida barters with Canadian diplomats
 
Steven Edwards
Canwest News Service
Tuesday, February 17, 2009

UNITED NATIONS - Suspected kidnappers of two Canadian diplomats on a United Nations mission to Niger have set a "prisoner exchange" as a condition for their release, Canwest News Service has learned.  This emerges as al-Qaida's wing in North Africa Tuesday claimed responsibility for holding Robert Fowler and his Foreign Affairs aide Louis Guay - as well as four Western tourists kidnapped in Niger's neighbour Mali, near the border between the two countries.  The "prisoner exchange" demand has complicated efforts to free the Canadians, who disappeared Dec. 14 along with their locally hired driver, Soumana Mounkaila.

Neither Canada nor the UN would have control over any prisoners the kidnappers might seek in the region.  As such, officials assigned to the search for the trio fear the quest for a resolution will be lengthy, sources said on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the investigation.  The search for Fowler and Guay extended some weeks ago into Mali which, like Niger, has been battling various rebel factions of the regionally dispersed Tuareg nomads. But Mali last year also saw the North African al-Qaida in Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) hold two Austrian tourists on its soil for months.

While the Austrians were released in October after AQIM demanded an $8 million ransom, the four additional Western tourists AQIM now says it is holding - they are two Swiss, a German and a Briton - were kidnapped in January.  "We are glad to bring good tidings to our Islamic nation about the success of the mujahedeen in carrying out two quality operations in Niger," a Maghreb Qaida spokesman said on an audio recording aired by the pan-Arab Al-Jazeera television.  The spokesman said militants "reserved the right to deal with the six captives under Islamic Shariah (law)," and added the group would soon announce its conditions.  Canada has said consistently it will not comment on whom it thinks may be holding the men, or issue any other information about efforts to win the men's release. To analysts, the al-Qaida reference to applying Shariah law is tantamount to a threat the hostages will be killed if the group's conditions are not met.  Algerian-based AQIM have claimed responsibility for a number of attacks in recent years, and a number of its members are jailed in Algeria and Tunisia.  Identification of the prisoner-exchange demand comes after Agence France-Presse reported from Mali Feb. 7 that Fowler and Guay appear on a videocassette now in the hands of Canadian authorities.

In the video, Fowler is seen asking for a response to unspecified demands of his armed kidnappers, AFP says, citing a northern Malian "elder" and another Malian source who had seen it.  While public knowledge of the videocassette came only after the AFP report, it was "sent" within days of the trio's disappearance, Canwest News Service has additionally learned.  Curiously, within a day of the kidnapping, a splinter group of the main Tuareg rebel group in Niger said it had snatched the men - but withdrew the claim the next day.  Then, towards the end of January, Canadian investigators visited northern Mali elders, AFP reported. Significantly, Malian elders were central to helping Austrian authorities reclaim their nationals, a source with knowledge of that investigation told Canwest News Service.  They "put pressure on" AQIM as the terrorist group held the tourists in Mali after snatching them in Tunis in February 2008, the source said.

In Niger, the government of President Mamadou Tandja has a public policy of not endorsing any talks with Niger-based Tuareg rebels, who demand up to 30 per cent of revenues from uranium mining in traditional Tuareg lands in northern Niger.  In Mali, meanwhile, the defence ministry announced Feb. 11 it had routed a faction of the Tuareg rebels on Malian soil that had refused to take part in an Algerian-brokered peace process.  In that operation, Mali said it took 22 Tuareg rebels prisoner.

The UN publicly confirmed last week that Canada had received the video showing Fowler and Guay, but added that UN investigators had at that point not received a copy.  "We have not seen it, but we have been told about it," spokeswoman Michele Montas told reporters at the daily UN media briefing.  The UN officially holds the lead in the investigation because all three men represented the UN.

Fowler, a former Canadian ambassador to the UN, was a UN envoy charged with trying to find avenues for peace against the backdrop of the rising Tuareg rebellion.  Guay, a veteran Foreign Affairs officer, was his aide. Mounkaila was a driver for the UN Development Program in Niger.  The trio's UN-marked vehicle was found abandoned Dec. 15 along the road they were taking to return, the day before, to the Niger capital of Niamey after they had visited a Canadian-run gold mine in the reputedly safe southwestern part of the country.

© Canwest News Service 2009

Copyright © 2009 CanWest Interactive, a division of CanWest MediaWorks Publications, Inc.. All rights reserved.

CanWest Interactive, a division of CanWest MediaWorks Publications, Inc.. All rights reserved.

 

[leroi]

More bad news (3 alleged pictures of hostages on link):

Al-Qaida N. Africa Claims 6 Hostages

(Reproduced under the Fair Dealing provision of the Copyright Act.)

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2009/02/19/Al-Qaida_N_Africa_claims_6_hostages/UPI-59611235066594/


NIAMEY, Niger, Feb. 19 (UPI) -- Al-Qaida's North Africa branch claims it is holding hostage a Canadian U.N. peace envoy, his aide and four tourists who were kidnapped in the Sahara.

A spokesman for al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb, an Algerian group that claims to have joined Osama bin Laden's terror network in 2006 but some say has simply adopted the name, threatened "to deal with the six kidnapped according to Islamic Shariah law," an audio recording played on pan-Arab TV station Al-Jazeera said.

This appears to be a threat to execute the six Westerners if the organization's demands are not met, Britain's Daily Telegraph reported.

An identical threat was posted on militant Web sites, said SITE, a U.S. organization that monitors militant messages.

The al-Qaida group didn't issue immediate demands for the hostages' release, the Telegraph reported.

Canadian diplomat Robert Fowler, the special envoy of U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to Niger, and aide Louis Guay, both diplomats, were kidnapped Dec. 14 near Niger's capital, Niamey.

Four tourists, including a Swiss couple, a German woman and a British man, were kidnapped Jan. 22 in neighboring Mali after attending a Tuareg cultural festival there, the BBC reported.

"We are aware of the reports but we have nothing further to comment," a U.N. spokeswoman said.

Swiss and British officials said they were seeking to secure the tourists' safety. Germany had no immediate comment.


© 2009 United Press International, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

 

[The Bread Guy]

Alleged photos of hostages on link, attachment

"Kidnapping the U.N. Envoy, his assistant and 4 European tourists"
Posted by Elsi at Takva Forum attributed to Al-Qaeda Organization in The Islamic West, retrieved 21 Feb 09 here (original in Arabic attached as .pdf)

In the Name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful

The Al-Qaeda Organization in The Islamic West

Kidnapping the U.N. Envoy, his assistant and 4 European tourists

Praise be to Allah, the Lord of the Worlds, and the sequel is for the pious, with no aggression except on the persecutes.

And prayer and peace be upon the one sent with sword as a mercy for the worlds;

At the time when the evil confederacy of Jews, Christians and apostates continues their aggression on Islam and its nations all over the world

And at a time which the sons of France and the slaves of America promote their fictional so-called "victories" over the Mujahideen, we are happy to announce these glad tidings to our Muslim Ummah, about the success of the Mujahideen in carrying out two strategic operations, on the land of Nigeria.

The first operation: The Mujahideen were enabled, by the Grace of Allah, two months ago, to kidnap two well-known Canadian Deplomats:

- The first one is: Robert Foller, who is the Canadian ex-ambassador, and now the current U.N. Envoy in Niger.

- The second is: His assistant Luise Gay, the Canadian ex-ambassador in Gabon.

The second operation: The Mujahideen were enabled, by the grace of Allah, on the 22nd of Jan. 2009 to kidnap 4 European tourists in Niger, and they are:

Edwen Dyer From Britain, Marianne Petzold from Germany, and Werner Greiner and Gabriella Burco Greiner from Switzerland.

And we announce to the public that the Mujahideen preserve their right in treating the six hostages according to the Islamic Law.

Also, the Mujahideen will later announce, by the Will of Allah, their demands and conditions to release these hostages.

Be assured we will not get bored or tired, Allah-Willing, to remind our Muslim brother that we will continuously be walking forward in the path of Jihad and fight, for the sake of helping the persecuted and the oppressed, and to defend our Muslim Ummah.

(....)

Wa Allahu Akbar, Allahu Akbar, Allahu Akbar.

The Might belongs to Allah, His messenger, and Mujahideen.

The Media Committee of the Al-Qaeda Organization in the Islamic West

Wednesday: the 22nd of Safar, 1430 H, which consists with 18th of Feb. 2008

Source: Al-Fajr Media Center

 

[leroi]

The haunting image of those hostages sufferring faces combined with al-Qaeda's gloating words rips the heart right out of my chest ... pure unadulterated evil ...

 

[tomahawk6]

I think they will be ransomed at some point. If they were americans ......

 

[The Bread Guy]

(A little bit) more from Canadian Press:

Canada's Foreign Affairs Department says it is aware of a reported demand by kidnappers holding two Canadian diplomats, but is not making any other comment.  Agence France-Press quotes a source in Mali as saying al-Qaida's North African branch is demanding the release of two Mauritanian members.  There is no independent way to verify the report, which represents the group's first demand for a ransom.  AFP says Canada has enlisted the help of several countries, including Mali, in an effort to secure the release of Robert Fowler, the UN secretary general's special envoy to Niger, and his aide, diplomat Louis Guay.  Foreign affairs spokesperson Lisa Monette says officials are aware of the media report but had no comment, while a United Nations spokeswoman also had no comment ....

 

[old medic]

Driver of Canadian envoys kidnapped in Niger freed
Mar. 23 2009
The Associated Press
copy at : http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20090323/driver_freed_090323/20090323?hub=World

UNITED NATIONS -- The United Nations says the driver of two Canadian diplomats kidnapped in Niger in December has been released unharmed.

It says Soumana Mounkaila, a Niger national, was freed after several governments in the region intervened.

He was kidnapped along with the UN Special Envoy for Niger, Robert Fowler, and Fowler's aide, Louis Guay.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon called on the kidnappers again today to release the two Canadians.

In Ottawa, a Foreign Affairs spokesperson Lisa Monette confirmed the driver's release. She says officials are working closely with Canada's partners to secure the freedom of the two diplomats.

Al-Qaida's North Africa branch, an Algeria-based group, has claimed to be holding the two Canadians along with four tourists -- two Swiss citizens, a German woman and a British man.

They were kidnapped in the desert in January near the border in Mali.