Abdullah (L) and Hussain talk to journalists at the Convention Center in Baghdad (AFP)

BAGHDAD - Two envoys from Britain’s leading Muslim organization arrived in Iraq Saturday, September 25, to try to secure the release of a Briton taken hostage by a militant group.

Daud Abdullah and Musharraf Hussain, from the respected Muslim Council of Britain (MCB), arrived in Baghdad late Saturday and said they would hold talks with religious leaders and some politicians and try to make contact with the kidnappers of Kenneth Bigley, 62, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).

He has been held by the Tawhid wal Jihad group of presumed Al-Qaeda operative Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi. He was snatched on September 16—along with two American colleagues, Jack Hensley and Eugene Armstrong who have since been beheaded.

“We will do everything to contact them (the captors) while we are here,” Abdullah told reporters upon arrival.

Abdullah sought to highlight the strong public opposition in Britain to the war on Iraq hoping this might have some resonance among the abductors.

Britain was a leading member of the US-led forces that invaded the country in 2003 and now has the second largest foreign troop presence in Iraq after the United States.

“We come from Britain which, though being part of the coalition, though being part of the mayhem and the destruction of Iraq, many people in Britain did not support this and I see that the Bigley family itself, as far as I know, was not in support of the war,” he said.

Religion of Mercy

Hussain, who is imam and director of the Karimia Institute in Nottingham, England, said they would try to seek common ground with the captors and remind them that Islam was a religion of mercy and compassion and against the killing of innocents and non-combatants.

“As Muslim brothers to these captors ... we want to give the message that our religion is one of compassion, of love, of non-violence and we want to see Iraq as a free and democratic, successful, happy and prosperous nation,” he said.

“That can only happen through non-violence, which is the way of the Muslim and our duty is to remind these Muslim brothers that that is what we should be doing.”

Before the envoys flew to Iraq, MCB chief Iqbal Sacranie said: “We appeal to the group that is holding Ken Bigley to release him without delay and without harm.”

“He is an elderly man and he is due to become a grandfather soon,” he said in a statement. “Be merciful. Our religion Islam does not allow us to harm the innocent.”

Bigley’s relatives have been relentless in their pleas to the captors and the hostage himself made a heart-rending video-taped appeal to British Prime Minister Tony Blair earlier this week.

Blair vowed Saturday to do whatever he can to secure the release of Bigley amid doubts over a claim on a website that the man was killed.

But the Foreign Office said the website—which earlier in the week claimed that Italian aid workers Simona Pari and Simona Torretta had been killed by their captors—was not credible.

The issue of abductions in Iraq has caused a great controversy worldwide with Muslims from the four corners of the world vigorously condemning such tactics in conformity with the rulings of Islam.

A well-known Algerian Islamic leader went on an open-ended hunger strike till all foreigners abducted in Iraq are released.

Abbasi Madani, the ailing leader of Algeria’s banned Islamic Salvation Front (FIS), has vowed to continue the hunger strike he began Tuesday, September 14, “until death”. (Click here to read Islam’s Stance on Killing Captives).