"We issued a fatwa urging the group to immediately free and not to harm the two French reporters," Al-Sumaidaie said (AFP)

BAGHDAD - As France remained optimistic Sunday, September 5, over the fate of its two kidnapped newsmen in Iraq, a leading Iraqi scholar issued a religious edict, demanding their captors to immediately release the French reporters and not to harm them.

“We issued a fatwa urging the group to immediately free and not to harm the two French reporters, in recognition of France’s position on Iraq,” Sheikh Mehdi Al-Sumaidaie, a senior scholar from the strict Wahhabi current of Islam, told Agence France-Presse (AFP) Sunday.

The scholar, an influential figure among strict Sunni Muslim groups claiming most kidnappings in Iraq lately, also lambasted the Iraqi government and US forces for staging a raid in the area where the pair was kidnapped, saying it had harmed efforts for their release.

“The attack on Latifiya disrupted the process of their release,” he said at a press conference.

Al-Sumaidaie was detained by the US occupation forces for lengthy periods after the fall of the ousted regime. He is the imam of Ibn Taimiyah Sunni Mosque and heads the Guidance and Fatwa Committee of the Salfist group.

Iraqi interim government forces backed by US troops staged their boldest raid yet against Iraqi fighters in Latifiya, a town south of Baghdad which had become a no-go area for foreigners and Iraqi security forces.

Experts had warned that stepped up military activity against strongholds held by Iraqis opposed to foreign troops on their soil in the area could harm the chances of rescuing Georges Malbrunot and Christian Chesnot, who have been held since August 20.

Earlier Sunday, a group calling itself the Black Banners Brigade of the Secret Islamic Army (SIA), called for a fatwa on hostage-taking in a videotaped statement aired on Dubai-based Al-Arabiya television.

“We call on the Committee of Ulema to issue a fatwa… defining these acts (of taking hostages),” one masked militant said, in reference to the most senior Sunni Muslim authority in the country.

The group, which on Wednesday released three Indians, three Kenyans and an Egyptian, said it was willing to conform with whatever the fatwa rules.

The Committee of Ulema (scholars) groups Iraq’s senior Muslim scholars.

The Dubai-based channel said the group was “convinced” that other Islamist groups, who have taken dozens of foreigners hostage in Iraq, would also conform to such a ruling if the committee specifies who can and can not be kidnapped.

Al-Arabiya said the group was referring to a statement earlier this month, also broadcast by the station, in which committee member Sheikh Ahmed Abdel Ghaffur Al-Samarai reportedly said “foreign workers are coming to Iraq for their livelihood and it is not permitted to kill them.”

Many foreigners accused of being spies or collaborating with US-led forces have been taken captive in Iraq. Some have been released while others have been killed, often brutally, and their execution graphically posted on so-called Islamist websites.

French Optimism

In Paris, cautious optimism prevailed over the fate of the two hostages who have been kidnapped for two weeks now, despite delay of their release.

French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier said Sunday that France believed the pair were in good health and that a “favorable outcome” to the crisis was possible.

Barnier, who was speaking after meeting President Jacques Chirac in the wake of his tour of the Middle East aimed at gathering support for the hostages in the Muslim world, said he was ready to return to the region if necessary.

“Our absolute priority remains today to secure the freedom of Christian Chesnot and Georges Malbrunot. Our priority remains their safety,” he said.

Rumors had been circulating that the journalists would be freed within days, but the return to Paris late Saturday of Barnier suggested their release was on hold, according to AFP.

On August 28, the group calling itself the Islamic Army in Iraq, which had kidnapped the journalists a week earlier, threatened to kill them unless France rescinded a law banning the Islamic headscarf and other conspicuous religious signs from state schools.

“As I speak we have genuine reasons to believe that they are both in good health and that a favorable outcome is possible,” said Barnier.

“We are working towards this with all our energy, calmly, prudently and with discretion,” he said, because “this is one of the conditions for their safety.”

French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin has called a meeting later Sunday of key ministers to discuss the crisis.

“We have hope, we are working for their freedom...I can’t tell you any more,” said Raffarin on a visit to the French Alpine resort of Avoriaz.

Obstacles

Meanwhile, a member of delegation from the French Council for the Muslim Faith (CFCM) which recently flew to Iraq to try to help free Chesnot and Malbrunot said a number of obstacles still lay in the path of any possible release.

“We are both cautious and worried: cautious because there is bombing and insecurity everywhere (in Iraq), and worried about how the transfer would be carried out,” said Mohamed Bechari.

“(The problem) of taking the two hostages to Amman remains the hottest now, as efforts are there to guarantee their personal safety after the hoped-for imminent release,” Bechari has told IOL Friday