Iraq: Abducted peace activists appeal Blair to pull out

sify: The peace activists including Indo-Canadian Harmeet Singh Sooden taken hostage by insurgents in Iraq have appealed the British Prime Minister Tony Blair to pull out troops from the country in a video aired Wednesday.

"I ask Mr Blair to take British troops out of Iraq and leave the Iraqi people to come to their own decisions on their government," said Norman Kember, 74, who was taken hostage last month along with Sooden, 32, fellow Canadian James Loney, 41, and American Tom Fox, 54.

Fox said: "As a representative of Christian Peacemaker Team, we feel that continued American and British occupation is not in the best interest of the Iraqi people."

The footage of the Chritian Peacemaker Team (CPT) activists carried by BBC is a longer version of the video aired on Qatar-based Al-Jazeera television on Friday.

The activists, seized in Baghdad, were shown in handcuffs and shackles. The group of kidnappers calling itself the Swords of Truth had accused them of spying for foreign forces in Iraq and threatened to kill them if Iraqi detainees in the country are not freed by Thursday.

CPT had on Tuesday urged the kidnappers to release the hostages unharmed. "While we believe the action of kidnapping is wrong, we do not condemn you as people. We recognise the humanity in each person, and respect it very much. This includes you, our colleagues and all people," it said in a statement.

"We appeal to your humanity to show mercy on our brothers and let them come back safely to us to continue to work," it added.

The CPT statement also said that it condemned the UK and US governments for their actions in Iraq. Link