TIMELINE: Kidnappings of journalists in the Gaza Strip

Fri Jun 1, 2007 7:02am EDT
 
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(Reuters) - Kidnapped BBC Gaza correspondent Alan Johnston said his captors had treated him well in an Internet video issued by them on Friday.

The undated video, posted on an Islamist Web site, is the first time Johnston has been seen or heard in public since he was seized on his way home from work on March 12.

Following are kidnappings of foreign journalists and journalists working for foreign news organizations in the Palestinian territory over the past two years:

Jan 8, 2005 - Two Spanish reporters, Ramon Lobo and Carmen Secanella, are briefly abducted by Palestinian militants.

Aug 15 - Gunmen abduct journalist Mohammad Ouathi, a French citizen of Algerian origin. He is freed a week later.

March 15, 2006 - The last of a group of foreign hostages kidnapped during a wave of violence are freed. Militants angered at an Israeli raid on a West Bank jail seized the two French nationals and a South Korean a day earlier. The three journalists were among nine foreigners snatched in Gaza and the West Bank.

Aug 27 - Two journalists working for U.S. Fox News are freed unharmed, after being forced to convert to Islam. Correspondent Steve Centanni, an American, and New Zealand-born cameraman Olaf Wiig, 36, were held for two weeks.

Oct 23 - Spanish photographer Emilio Morenatti working for the Associated Press is snatched by four gunmen as he leaves a Gaza City apartment. He is released 12 hours later.

Jan 7, 2007 - Palestinian gunmen free journalist Jaime Razuri, a Peruvian photographer for the French news agency Agence France-Presse, after holding him for almost a week.

March 12 - Alan Johnston disappears while driving. Army of Islam, a little-known group, in May claims responsibility for abducting him. On June 1 his captors released an Internet video repeating their demand for Britain to free Muslim prisoners, particularly the Islamist cleric Abu Qatada.

 

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