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Red Cross wants access to Shalit
06/09/2007 12:06 - (SA)
Gaza - The International Committee of the Red Cross stepped up pressure on Hamas on Wednesday to allow it to see an Israeli soldier held captive by Palestinian militants from the Gaza Strip for more than a year.
"We will leave no stone unturned," ICRC director-general
Angelo Gnaedinger told reporters after discussing the fate of
Sergeant Gilad Shalit with Ismail Haniyeh, who heads the Hamas
administration in the coastal Palestinian territory.
"We will keep pressing (Hamas) to see him."
Gunmen from Hamas and two other Palestinian militant groups
abducted Shalit in a June, 2006 border raid. They have demanded
that Israel free hundreds of Palestinian prisoners for the
soldier. Israel has balked at releasing senior jailed militants.
Red Cross officials said they raised Shalit with Hamas in
five previous meetings, but that Gnaedinger's visit was the most
senior-level appeal. Vouching for the wellbeing of prisoners of
war is among the Swiss-based agency's international roles.
Hamas, an Islamist group isolated in Gaza since it ousted
forces loyal to secular Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in
June, has allowed no outside contact with Shalit. It has cited
concern Israel could try to mount a rescue raid.
Hamas has said Shalit is in good condition and released a
letter and a scripted voice recording by the 21-year-old
conscript.
A Hamas official quoted Haniyeh, who served as prime
minister in a government dissolved by Abbas, as telling
Gnaedinger that "security complications" prevented
"communications with the factions holding the soldier".
"We hope that the entire crisis will end and that
Palestinian prisoners and the soldier Shalit will be released in
an honourable prisoner-swap deal," Haniyeh said, according to
the official.
- Reuters
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