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September 14, 2004
You are on the invidual archive page of Aussie hostages. Click Simon World weblog for the main page.
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Aussie hostages
First Jakarta, now reports two Australians have been kidnapped in Iraq. Which is kind of puzzling, because all Australians working in Iraq have been accounted for. Furthermore the kidnappers haven't named their "hostages" despite telling Australia they have 24 hours to leave Iraq or the hostages will be killed. Which makes rash claims that Howard will "be under pressure" look premature at best and stupid at worst. The good news is Mark Latham continues to follow the path of common sense in agreeing there can be no negotiations with terrorists. Let's hope this is a hoax. As always Arthur has more. And there are some heartening words for Australians in this thread at LGF. The ABC interviews an expert saying to take this seriously. There's a money quoted with my emphasis: You should be taking it very seriously. Many of these groups make claims, many of them have carried them out, although there is hope after all in certain cases, such as in the case of Corporal Wassoon, who was reported executed, it turned out that was frankly a lie.Thanks Spain and Philippines. UPDATE: Map of the alleged kidnapping here and the contingency plan has been activated. UPDATE 2: Morning in Iraq and still no news. It's sounding more like a hoax at this stage. UPDATE 3: We're getting towards noon in Iraq and still the claims are unconfirmed; meanwhile Iraqi terrorists manage to kill more of their countrymen, women and children, including a school. posted by Simon on 09.14.04 at 11:07 AM in the
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TrackBack URL for this entry: http://blog.mu.nu/cgi/trackback.cgi/45528 Send a manual trackback ping to this post. Two Australians Kidnapped: 24 Hour Ultimatum Given Excerpt: Finally, these guys think of a name which actually describes them. They call themselves the 'Horror Brigade'. Yup, that pretty much sums it up. UPDATE 9/14: Could this be a hoax? Or maybe this is just a case of all... Weblog: mypetjawa v. 2.0 (beta) Tracked: September 14, 2004 10:52 PM
Comments:
Like these guys would have stopped kidnapping people and killing them if the Philippines hadn't given in? And I don't see where Spain fits in... unless you mean throwing a government out of power that refused to listen to the people and lied to them as caving in to terrorists. And by all this, should the US and the world be heeping praise on the Syrians for ending the kidnap gang reign in Lebanon (y'remember when Ronald Reagan negotiated with radical Islamic kidnappers and illegally sold arms to the Iranians as part of caving in to "Islamo-fascists"?) posted by: Tom - Daai Tou Laam on 09.14.04 at 04:21 PM [permalink]It's pretty simple really. The Philippines negotiated with and gave in to the kidnappers, effectively rewarding and encouraging them to continue. Kidnapping may have continued but the Philippines decision made it guaranteed to happen and happen often. As for Spain that's a complicated one, but at least part of the result of the new Spanish Government and their immediate withdrawal from Iraq was again an encouragement and reward for terror. I'm not second-guessing Spain's electorate. I'm just saying the result had consequences on other nations, in this case Australia. As for your Syrian example it is obviously spurious - Syria itself engages in kidnapping and other forms of torture and terror itself. It may have stopped Lebanon's civil war but at huge and ongoing cost. If you were going to cite an example, why not cite the North Korean plight of South Korea "kidnapping" their nationals? posted by: Simon on 09.14.04 at 04:52 PM [permalink]Syria engages in kidnapping of foreign nationals? Huh? Where's the evidence of that one. And the kidnapping has stopped in Beirut because the Syrians put an end to the nonsense. It didn't stop because everybody refused to negotiate with the terrorists, because the US under Reagan did. And if the kidnapping in Iraq wouldn't have stopped if the Philippines didn't "cave in", then how can you say the Philippines' actions caused any results for Australia? The Philippines would have everyone pulled out of Iraq now anyway, they'd have a citizen dead, and the kidnappers would still be on a rampage regardless. As for North Korea, that is spurious. Though it has led North Korea to close diplomatic and travel ties with the third-party country involved. (Vietnam, I think.) |
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