Kidnappers of Micah Garen reportedly ready to free him

Sheikh Aws al-Khafaji, an aide of Shiite rebel leader Moqtada al-Sadr, said journalist Micah Garen's kidnappers told him today they would release him after today's Friday prayers. Garen said in a video broadcast by the pan-Arab TV station Al-Jazeera that he was being well-treated by his kidnappers. ______________________________________________________________ 19.05.2004 - Reporters Without Borders calls on rebel leader to obtain journalist's release Reporters Without Borders today appealed to Shiite rebel leader Moqtada al-Sadr to help win the release of American journalist Micah Garen from kidnappers who have said they will execute him. "We are horrified at this threat," the worldwide press freedom organisation said, urging Sadr to use his influence to obtain the release of Garen and his Iraqi translator, Amir Doshe, as he did with British reporter James Brandon, who was freed by kidnappers on 13 August. "Journalists are civilians and their lives must not be used as a means of pressure by various sides in wartime. They must never be taken to represent the government policies of the countries they are citizens of." Garen and Doshe were kidnapped on 14 August by a group of Iraqi fighters near the southern city of Nasiriya. The pan-Arab TV station Al-Jazeera broadcast a video on 18 August in which the kidnappers threatening to execute Garen if US forces did not pull out of the holy city of Najaf within 48 hours. The kidnappers of Brandon, who works for the British Sunday Telegraph, said on 12 August they would execute him if US troops did not leave Najaf within 24 hours. He was freed the next day after an appeal by Sheikh Akram al-Kaabi, a close aide of Sadr. Marie-Hélène Carleton, Garen's fiancée, appealed to the kidnappers through Reporters Without Borders on 16 August to free him, saying he was simply doing his job by reporting independently on events in Iraq and also helping to preserve the country's archaeological heritage. Garen was making a film about cultural history and protection of ancient sites in war zones for his own New York based production company, Four Corners Media, which supplies film, photo and written reports for major US media.