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Beheaded man 'told to leave'
12/05/2004 10:51 - (SA)
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| Nick Berg in orange surrounded by captors. (AFP) |
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Baghdad - An American civilian who was beheaded in a grisly video posted online had been warned to leave Iraq but refused, US officials said on Wednesday. The masked men who butchered him claimed they were angered by coalition abuses of Iraqi prisoners.
A US official said Berg was in Iraq "of his own accord" and had been advised to leave Iraq but refused. The official refused to elaborate but promised more information later on Wednesday.
According to his family, Berg spoke to his parents on March 24 and told them he would return home on March 30. But he was detained by Iraqi police at a checkpoint in Mosul on March 24.
Berg was turned over to US officials and detained for 13 days. His father, Michael, said his son wasn't allowed to make phone calls or contact a lawyer.
On April 5, the Bergs filed suit in federal court in Philadelphia, contending that their son was being held illegally by the US military. The next day Berg was released. His family last heard from him on April 9.
Berg's killing happened amid a climate of intense anti-Western sentiment, which flared in Iraq after last month's crackdown on Shiite extremists and the siege of Fallujah. Anger at the United States swelled with the publication of photographs showing Iraqis abused and humiliated at Abu Ghraib prison, which continue to stir rage throughout the Arab world.
US officials had feared the shocking photographs would endanger the lives of American troops and civilians.
The FBI is analysing the Internet video, an official said on condition of anonymity.
Danny Pearl
The decapitation recalled the videotaped beheading of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in 2002 in Pakistan. Four Islamic militants have been convicted of kidnapping Pearl, but seven suspects -including those who allegedly slit his throat - remain at large.
Last month, Iraqi militants videotaped the killing of Italian hostage Fabrizio Quattrocchi, but the Arab TV network Al-Jazeera refused to air it because it was too graphic.
In the video of Berg, the executioners said they had tried to trade him for prisoners at Abu Ghraib.
"For the mothers and wives of American soldiers, we tell you that we offered the US administration to exchange this hostage for some of the detainees in Abu Ghraib and they refused," one of the men read from a statement.
April 9, when Berg last made contact with his family, also was the day that seven American contractors and two military men disappeared after their supply convoy was attacked on the outskirts of Baghdad.
Four missing
Four of the Halliburton workers and one of the military men have since been confirmed dead. Halliburton worker Thomas Hamill escaped his captors May 2 and returned home to Mississippi on Saturday. The two other Halliburton workers and the other soldier remain missing.
Two soldiers also vanished on April 9. One was later found dead and the other, Pfc Keith M Maupin of Batavia, Ohio, was taken captive and remains missing.
News24 has made the pictures leading up to the beheading of Nick Berg, as well as the pictures of his family, available in our picture galleries. Click here
- AP
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