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BBC 'increasingly concerned' for Gaza kidnap reporter
Appears the price just went up.GAZA CITY (AFP) - The BBC appealed on Monday for help to find a veteran British correspondent who was kidnapped at gunpoint in the Gaza Strip a week ago, saying concern was mounting for his well-being. Alan Johnston, the British broadcaster's main correspondent in Gaza for the past three years, has been neither seen nor heard from since gunmen forced him out of his car while the 44-year-old was driving home from work on March 12. Well, the end of another day in paradise. Time to kickback, have a coupla beers...oh-oh. "We call on everyone with influence on this situation... it is time to redouble our efforts, all of us, now that Alan has been missing for more than a week," BBC Middle East bureau chief Simon Wilson told a Gaza news conference. Please. Release him so I can get the hell outta Gaza. I'll pay anything... "Although we have not been able to establish exactly what has happened to Alan, it seems certain that he has been abducted and is being held somewhere in the Gaza Strip," the BBC said in a statement released in London. "As time passes, we are growing increasingly concerned about Alan's safety. Over the past week, we have worked intensively with the authorities in Gaza and elsewhere to try to locate Alan, and we continue to receive assurances that everything possible is being done." I assure you, CSI:Gaza is "It is disappointing that, after seven days, there has still been no firm word either about his whereabouts or his condition," it said. Must we send for another bag o' money? In a video released by the BBC, Johnston's father Graham appealed to the captors to release his son. "Holding Alan is not doing the Palestinian people any favours, quite the opposite," he said. "It's no way to treat a friend of the Palestinian people. All I can say to the men who are holding Alan (is) please let my son go, now, today." Yes, they're always so grateful to their "friends", especially the infidel ones... Experienced reporter Johnston, who was previously posted to Afghanistan and Uzbekistan, was one of the few Western journalists still based in the increasingly lawless Gaza Strip. Jeez, wonder why that is? Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas and Hamas, the majority party in the new unity government, have condemned the abduction, the latest in a spate of kidnappings that has seen around 20 foreigners seized over the past year. I condemn the capture of this To protest against Johnston's abduction, the Palestinian journalists' union in Gaza City said it would observe a 24-hour strike on Tuesday. "We won't guarantee any coverage, pending any Israeli aggression," the union announced. Boys, the Israeli's are the least of your problems... In the West Bank political capital of Ramallah, foreign and local journalists staged a sit-in at which Palestinian information minister Mustafa al-Barghuti condemned Johston's abduction as an "unacceptable criminal act." As opposed to the usual "acceptable criminal act"... Hostages are frequently used as bargaining chips to gain concessions from the Palestinian Authority, and so far all have been released unharmed. Yeah, so far it's a frat prank, right? But there's a first time for everything. The longest captivity endured by foreign hostages was the two-week ordeal last August of two journalists for the US-based Fox News television network. I wonder how their conversion's going? Posted by: tu3031 2007-03-19 |
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