By LEE KEATH, Associated Press Writer BAGHDAD, Iraq - Insurgents shot down a U.S. Apache attack helicopter in west Baghdad on Sunday, the military said. The fate of its two crewmembers was unknown.
Heavy fighting was taking place in the area for the third straight day.
"A 1st Cavalry A8-64 Apache helicopter was downed by unknown ground fire west
of Baghdad at around 11:05 a.m. The condition of the crew is unknown," the
spokesman said.
U.S. troops blocked traffic on the main highway out of Baghdad on the western
edge. Large palls of black smoke were seen rising from the nearby area of Abu
Ghraib, where at least four helicopters were seen hovering overhead.
In a videotape released Saturday, insurgents who kidnapped an American
civilian threatened to kill and mutilate him unless U.S. forces withdraw from
the city of Fallujah.
Meanwhile, insurgents holding three Japanese hostage said they would be freed
in 24 hours. The captors had threatened to burn the civilians alive unless Japan
pulled its troops out of Iraq (news
- web
sites), a demand Japan refused.
The tape of the American, broadcast on the Arab TV station Al-Jazeera, showed
him identifying himself as Thomas Hamill, 43, from Mississippi. In other footage
with no audio, he stood in front of an Iraqi flag, his _expression_ calm but wary
as his captors announced their threat on his life.
A voice-over read by an Al-Jazeera announcer quoted Hamill as saying he was
being treated well and that he works for a "private company that supports the
military action."
His wife, Kellie, contacted at their home in Macon, Miss., confirmed that her
husband had been captured. She told The Associated Press he works for the
Houston-based engineering and construction company Kellogg, Brown & Root, a
division of Halliburton, and referred all other comment to the employer.
"I am in good shape," the voice-over quoted Hamill as saying. "They were good
to me. They gave me antibiotics. I have no idea what is going on Fallujah. I
hear there is a siege and people are living in some sort of prison."
"I hope to return home one day, and I want my family to know that these
people are taking care of me, and provide me with food, water and a place to
sleep."
Hamill stood in front of the red-white-and-black Iraqi flag, its emblazoned
slogan "God is great" prominent above his head. His eyes darted back and forth,
but he appeared calm.
His captors warned he would meet a worse fate than four American civilians
killed in Fallujah on March 31, their bodies burned and mutilated by a mob,
unless U.S. forces end their assault on the city "within 12 hours, starting 6
p.m." � 10 a.m. Saturday, EDT.
"At the end of this period, he will be treated worse than those who were
killed and burned in Fallujah," the voice-over said.
Hamill was snatched Friday by gunmen who attacked a fuel convoy he was
guarding on the main highway on Baghdad's western edge, the latest in a string
of kidnappings in Iraq. Footage released earlier Saturday showed him being
whisked away in a car, a gunman in the back seat with him waving an automatic
weapon.
Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt refused to comment Saturday on efforts to free Hamill
or other captives, saying it "would not be helpful to discuss" any plans.
Meanwhile, other insurgents who kidnapped two Japanese men and a woman said
they would free their captives within 24 hours because of an appeal from Sunni
clerics. The kidnappers, identifying themselves as the "Muhahedeen Squadron,"
announced the decision in a statement received by al-Jazeera.
In an TV interview with the Japanese network Asahi, Shinzo Abe, the No. 2
official in Japan's ruling party, said the release was expected around noon
Sunday Japanese time.
But Sunday evening the hostages had still not been released, according to a
Japanese Embassy official in Baghdad, Hiroyuki Oura, who would not say whether
they were safe or whether negotiations for their release were ongoing.
Earlier, a senior administration official said the release could be delayed.
"It could take a little longer," Deputy Cabinet Secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda
said as he joined other officials at the prime minister's residence. "We are
waiting extremely hopefully."
Videotape delivered to Al-Jazeera, as well as Associated Press Television
News, on Thursday showed the three Japanese � two aid workers and a journalist �
blindfolded and surrounded by armed, masked men dressed in black.
The three were identified as aid workers Noriaki Imai, 18, and Nahoko Takato,
34; and photojournalist Soichiro Koriyama, 32.
Meanwhile, a group calling itself the "Marytr Ahmed Yassin Brigades" in the
city of Ramadi, west of Baghdad and Fallujah, claimed in videotape obtained by
APTN to have 30 hostages from a variety of countries.
The footage, also aired on Al-Arabiya TV, showed no images of any hostages,
and there was no way to verify the group's claim to be holding "Japanese,
Bulgarians, Americans, Israelis, Spanish and Koreans, a total of 30
individuals."
"If the siege of Fallujah is not lifted, we will cut off their heads," a
masked man on the videotape said.
He also said his fighters killed four American soldiers and said "we have
their bodies." The tape showed an image of a body with bloody khaki pants and
covered with a blanket, said to be one of the U.S. soldiers.
Insurgents elsewhere in Iraq have seized a Canadian and an Arab from
Jerusalem. A British citizen and two German security officials from their
country's embassy in Baghdad are also missing, though it is not known if they
have been kidnapped.
The Mulindwas Communication Group
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