British hostage Bigley escaped briefly before beheaded

8.40pm

BAGHDAD - British hostage Kenneth Bigley escaped briefly from his captors shortly before they beheaded him in Iraq, insurgent sources said on Saturday.

They said Bigley managed to get away for about half an hour with the help of one of his captors before he was caught in farmland near the town of Latifiya, southwest of Baghdad.

Bigley was beheaded in Latifiya soon after his recapture on Thursday afternoon, one source said, adding: "He never made it to the main street."

The fate of his accomplice was not immediately known. Bigley had been held by the Tawhid and Jihad group led by Jordanian Islamist militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

British and Iraqi officials have declined comment on an earlier report from a Western security source that Bigley was killed after trying to escape with help from an insider, but they have denied that he died after a failed rescue attempt.

Blair's government, which for three weeks refused to bargain with Bigley's kidnappers even after they killed his two American colleagues, revealed on Friday that it had opened secret contacts with them in the days before his death.

On Friday a Reuters journalist saw a video in Baghdad in which the 62-year-old construction engineer made a final despairing plea for his life before militants suspected of fostering ties to al Qaeda severed his head with a knife.

- REUTERS


Herald Feature: Iraq