US hostage pleads for life on video

By The Newsroom
Published 14th Apr 2005, 01:00 BST
AN AMERICAN contract worker taken hostage in Iraq appealed for his life in a video released yesterday.

The tape emerged on a day of violence in Iraq - bombings left at least 14 people dead. It also coincided with a visit there by the deputy US Secretary of State, Robert Zoellick, the second by a senior US official in as many days.

The video, broadcast by the al-Jazeera television station, showed a man, identified by the American embassy as Jeffrey Ake, from Indiana, sitting behind a desk holding a passport. Armed and masked militants held assault rifles at his head. He was seized on Monday while working on a reconstruction project near the capital, the embassy said.

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