Hassan's killing 'despicable'

2004-11-18 07:55

Sydney - The mutilated body of a Caucasian woman found in the Iraqi city of Fallujah earlier this week appears to be that of missing aid worker Margaret Hassan, Australian Prime Minister John Howard said on Thursday.

Howard told parliament that there was every indication that Hassan was also the woman who appeared in a video received by Al-Jazeera Tuesday showing an armed man shooting at a blind-folded woman.

"The body found in Fallujah appears to have been Margaret's and the video of the execution of a Western woman appears, on all the available information, to have been genuine," Howard said.

The body of a blonde-haired woman with her legs and arms cut off and throat slit was found on Sunday lying on a street in Fallujah, a notorious Iraqi enclave for hostage-takers.

Hassan, 59, head of Care International's Iraq operations, was seized in Baghdad on October 19 while on her way to work. She was married to an Iraqi, held British, Irish and Iraqi citizenship.

Howard extended his sympathy to Hassan's family over the "despicable" killing.

"The inhumanity of Margaret Hassan's killers passes description. Such people are to be condemned without the slightest hesitation or qualification," he said.

- AFP