邦人の方の無事をお祈りします
今回、イラクの過激グループに人質になった３人の方の無事をお祈り申し上げます。
自作自演だとか、
リスクを犯して入国と言う意見もある様子ですが、
イラク全土に広がっている反米（英）の大局からみて、可能性は少ないと思います。
リスクを犯して、自己責任で、と言う事もありますが、
今回のイラクの復興は、民間人の力がないと不可能であると言われています。
現在どの位の民間人がイラクにいるのか？
10000～15000だったかな？もっと多いかも。
今日のニュースでは、イギリス人の民間人（メディアも含む）だけで、2000人位だそうです。 Missionary(布教)関係の人も我々が考えている以上に多いようです。
だから、今回の日本人３人が特別他の外国人に比べ異常であったとは思えないのですが、もともと日本は、アメリカに協力していると見られ、ターゲットの国として上げられていただけに、状況を踏まえ、必要以上の警戒・警備が必要ではなかったのかと思います。
ソフトターゲットと呼ばれる民間人を中心に標的を変え始めたイラク過激分子側にとって、日本人は、好都合でありしかも、見せしめの効果が高いとされていたのかもしれません。
関連エントリー
テロリストの見方か？ 朝日新聞
日本で公開されている情報・画像がどの程度かは分かりませんが、こちらのTimes誌のページの引用です。
３人に皆様が、直面している現実を少しでも知っておく必要があると思い引用しました。
こちらのテレビでは、このシーンとともに、女性の悲鳴声も聞こえていたシーンが放映されました。
どうか御無事でいて欲しいです。
記事を読むには登録が必要(忘れていました）なので、全文と写真を引用します。
(kagegeさん連絡ありがとう）
Rebels hold the world hostage
By Richard Lloyd Parry , Tokyo Correspondent and Tom BaldwinMilitants threaten to burn Japanese alive
THE US-led coalition in Iraq was under unprecedented strain last night after an Islamic militant group threatened to burn alive three kidnapped Japanese civilians unless Tokyo withdrew its troops from the country.
Chilling video footage, broadcast on the Arabic news channel al-Jazeera, showed the two men and one woman being forced to lie on the floor as knives and swords were pointed at their throats.“Withdraw your forces from our country and go home or we will burn them alive and feed them to the fighters. You have three days,” said the message from the captors.
A British man was also kidnapped, and armed Iraqi fighters seized seven South Korean missionaries and two Palestinian aid workers in a savage new tactic apparently designed to break the will of the coalition’s junior members. A Canadian was also kidnapped.
The two Palestinians, who held Israeli identity cards, were later paraded on Iranian TV and accused of spying for Israel.
The kidnapped Briton was named as Gary Teeley, 37, who was believed to have been working as a civilian contractor on a US base near the southern city of al-Nasiriyah.
The Foreign Office said last night that Mr Teeley was married with five children and had been working as a consultant for a laundry company.
The Koreans were later freed, but the Japanese hostage crisis has the potential to bring down the Government of Junichiro Koizumi, the Prime Minister.
The military contingents of other coalition partners, who had been deliberately deployed in Iraq’s previously peaceful Shia south, have also come under sustained attack.
American soldiers rushed to reinforce Polish and Bulgarian troops in Karbala after they fought all-night gun battles with radical Shia militiamen.
In the Sunni town of Fallujah, where four US contractors were lynched last week, Marines were caught up in ferocious street fighting more intense than any resistance encountered during last year's invasion. The insurgents fired mortars and rocket propelled grenades and staged hit and run raids, only to melt away in alleyways. Lieutenant-General Ricardo Sanchez, the top US military leader in Iraq, vowed that the town of al-Kut would be re-taken “imminently” after Ukrainian troops were driven out by Shia gunmen.
Tony Blair discussed the deepening Iraq crisis in a telephone call to President Bush, but Downing Street denied that the Prime Minister had been doing a “ring round” of other coalition leaders to shore up support.
A spokesman insisted that Britain and America remained resolute in the face of the latest violent uprisings, and said Mr Blair would use his visit to Washington next week to underline the coalition’s determination to transfer power to an Iraqi-led adminstration on June 30.
“There will be a united front on this issue,” he said. “The insurgents will not be allowed to knock us off course.”But there were unmistakable signs of alarm among America’s smaller allies in Iraq. Kazakhstan has announced that it will pull its troops out of Iraq next month. South Korea said that its troops had been forced to suspend their humanitarian work. Germany announced the withdrawal of its civilian aid workers.
The kidnapping of the three Japanese creates a particularly acute crisis for Mr Koizumi, who has emerged as one of Mr Bush’s most loyal supporters on Iraq, though a spokesmen insisted last night that Japan would not withdraw its 550 ground troops.
The victims of the kidnap, by a hitherto unknown group calling itself Saraya al-Mujahidin (Mujahideen Brigades), are Soichiro Koriyama, a 32-year-old freelance photographer, Nahoko Takato, a 34-year-old female humanitarian volunteer, and an 18-year -old boy named Noriaki Imai who left school last month. They met in Amman, and were seized on the notoriously dangerous road linking the Jordanian capital with Baghdad.
Mr Koizumi, since dispatching members of the Self-Defence Forces to southern Iraq earlier this year, has been braced for the deaths of his own soldiers. Hours before news of the kidnapping, he insisted that his determination would not be shaken by acts of violence after shells exploded close to the Japanese base in the town of Samawa. But the capture of three civilians, including one who under Japanese law is still a child, will generate a wave of public sympathy and anxiety.
Pulling out the SDF now would irreparably damage Mr Koizumi’s credibility, both domestically and internationally. But if the hostages are killed, the reaction among the Japanese public and Mr Koizumi’s political enemies has the potential to bring down his Government.
Mr Koizumi has been accused of sacrificing principle and self-interest in order to please the United States. Japan’s physical contribution to the coalition effort in Iraq is relatively small, but the support of the world’s second- richest country is symbolically valuable. The fall of Mr Koizumi would deprive Mr Bush and Mr Blair of one of their most stalwart supporters. Much now depends on the Japanese Government’s handling of the crisis and the development of public opinion over the next few days.
“It seems the Government is not considering withdrawing the SDF, but we want them to come home safely,” Shuichi Takato, the younger brother of Nahoko Takato, told The Times last night. “We all know why the Japanese Government sent the SDF to Iraq. Is the big country (the US) so important?”.
The seven South Korean evangelists were abducted at gunpoint yesterday while driving from Amman to Baghdad. An eighth escaped when her Iraqi driver drove off with her still in the car. Her colleagues were freed once they were able to confirm their nationality, and told South Korean news networks that they had been escorted back to Baghdad by their captors. The Seoul Government insisted that the kidnappings would not affect its plans to send 3,600 troops to Iraq. Two Labour MPs last night demanded the recall of Parliament on Monday because of the “dire” situation in Iraq.
Posted 2004年4月 9日 02:46 by Hiro Permalink Comments(7) Trackbacks(2)
