Jill Carroll: kidnappers threaten to kill, again

J. Scott Tynes, a friend of the kidnapped freelance journalist Jill Carroll, says:

There is breaking new from Al Rai TV in Kuwait that's just come in here in the last five minutes. According to Al Rai, the kidnappers say they will carry out a threat to kill Jill unless their demands are met by a Feb. 26 deadline.

The station is citing sources that are "close to her captors." The chairman of the station, Jassem Doodai, declined to specify the kidnapper's demands when questioned about it by a reporter from Reuters.

Previously Jill has said that the group was demanding the release of all female detainees held in Iraq. Five were released, but US and Iraqi officials have denied there was any quid pro quo with regard to those releases. 450 detainees were released over the last 48 hours in Iraq, but none were women. It is unclear from this statement if the kidnappers have additional demands that are not yet being released. And it is unclear what else was in the letter that Jill cryptically mentioned that she was providing in her third video.

One thing is certain, the setting of a deadline with some time ahead of it is worrying, as it carries the weight of being a "considered" deadline. We are all still hopeful that something can be worked out as this new channel seems to be opening. But, without a shadow of a doubt, we are all very worried. We'll update this post on Natasha's blog when we know anything more.

Link to previous Boing Boing posts on the abduction of Jill Carroll.

Update, 1:15pm PT: J. Scott Tynes says,

Xeni, there's been a few updates.

One: Al Rai's editor, Jassem Boudai, is indicating that there is some confirmation that Jill is staying "in a safe house" with women somewhere in Baghdad.

Two: Confirmation of what we'd said before: There was audio on the previous tapes but Aljazeera did not air it in an effort to control the message and silence critics about its "open mic" policy for terrorists. This seems savvy editorial control. There was tremendous media speculation about "why were the tapes silent." They were not. A call to Aljazeera would have made this clear.

A second update highlights an Associated Press report analyzing why Al Rai television got this tape and how and why they might have chosen to air it in full. It is a top drawer analysis of the media manoeuvrings taking place during this terrible ordeal.

Hopefully some of the new information released and out there through various channels today can help get Jill freed soon.