WASHINGTON, Jan. 20 (UPI) -- A Pentagon official said Friday he was unaware of any plan to release female Iraqi prisoners from U.S. custody as demanded by kidnappers of a U.S reporter.
Kidnappers in Iraq calling themselves the Revenge Brigade on Jan. 7 abducted American Jill Carroll, a freelance journalist working for the Christian Science Monitor.
They have threatened to kill Carroll, 28, if all Iraqi female prisoners are not released Friday.
Bryan Whitman, a senior Pentagon spokesman, said Friday there are fewer than 10 female Iraqi prisoners in U.S. custody, and he was unaware of attempts to review and release them in response to the kidnappers' threat.
U.S. policy is not to negotiate with kidnappers.
Carroll was abducted on her way back from a scuttled interview with a Sunni politician in Baghdad. Her translator was murdered, and her driver thrown out of the car.
On Friday, that politician, Adnan Dulaimi, head of the General Conference of the Iraqi People, pleaded for her release at a press conference.
Her abduction has been roundly condemned throughout Iraq and much of the Muslim world.
According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, at least 36 journalists have been kidnapped in Iraq. Five of them have been executed. In total, 60 journalists have been killed in Iraq since the war began, from accidents, military action and executions.
