Salopek, an worker of CGG, a French geophysical providers firm, was kidnapped on July 22 close to Cairo on his means again to the town. If confirmed it would be the first known video featuring a Western hostage held by Sinai Province, which changed its name from Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis after it pledged allegiance to Islamic State.
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Footage released on Wednesday showed Tomislav Salopek kneeling down in front of a fighter, reading a statement from the group demanding the release of female prisoners in Egyptian prisoners.
Upon the appearance of the video, the Croatian government said it was doing everything to resolve “the hard situation” of the abducted Croatian citizen. He said he had been captured by Islamic State militants July 22. “They need to substitute me for the Muslim womans arrested in Egyptian prisons”, the person says in awkward English.The deal should be made “before 48 hours from now [Wednesday]”, said Salopek, adding that if the agreement fails the jihadists will kill him.
The UK Daily Mail thinks the ISIS militant holding a knife to Salopek’s throat in the video might just be “Jihadi John”, a.k.a. Mohammed Emwazi of west London, the British-accented jihadi who was a regular fixture in Islamic State murder videos prior to the exposure of his true identity.
Pusic, who is expected to meet with her Egyptian counterpart, also traveled with Salopek’s wife, Natasa.
Croatian interior minister Ranko Ostojic said on Wednesday that the ministry is in contact with agencies from allied states, while “the security has been raised to a highest level”.
In recent months, Islamic militants in Sinai have launched increasingly sophisticated attacks that have killed dozens of Egyptian soldiers and police. “Otherwise, soldiers of the Sinai Wilayet will kill me”, he said.
The threat to execute Salopek came a day before Egypt’s inauguration of the “new” Suez Canal in the port city of Ismailiya. The military spokesman and the presidency could not be reached for comment.
Although it has been battling an IS insurgency in the sparsely populated Sinai Peninsula, the North African country has been spared the hostage-taking of foreigners and horrific executions carried out by jihadists in Syria and Libya.
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Thousands of people, mostly Islamists, have been jailed since the army overthrew Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in 2013 and unleashed a deadly crackdown on his supporters.
