10 hostages freed in Iraq

2004-10-10 22:47

Doha - An Islamist group in Iraq announced on Sunday it had released 10 Turkish hostages after their company pulled out of the country, Al-Jazeera television reported.

"An armed group calling itself Salafist Abu Bakr al-Seddiq Group released 10 Turkish hostages it had been holding for 40 days," the news channel said.

"The group said in a statement that the 10 were freed after the Turkish company (employing them) stopped operations and totally pulled out of Iraq," Al-Jazeera added.

A Turkish construction company announced on September 21 that it was freezing its activities in Iraq after 10 of its workers were taken hostage.

"We are suspending our activities in Iraq... until the injustice against our company and 10 innocent Turkish workers is undone," Ali Haydar Veziroglu, the chairperson of the Ankara-based Vinsan company, said in a statement.

His announcement came three days after Al-Jazeera reported that the Salafist group said it kidnapped 10 employees of a US-Turkish company and threatened to kill them unless the firm halted its operations in Iraq within three days.

Veziroglu said Vinsan has no US partner in its $161m project to build a highway near Baghdad.

Iraq has been plagued by a hostage-taking epidemic, terrorising hundreds of foreigners and locals.

Some have been released - many for ransom - others executed and the fate of the rest is unknown.

Turkish nationals, driving convoys of supplies across Iraq to US army bases, are an easy target, with five drivers known to have been kidnapped and killed.

- AFP