US Muslim Group Urges Freeing Of Reporter
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By-Sameer Yacoub
The Associated Press
Saturday January 21, 2006
http://ap.org

Baghdad, Iraq--A US Muslim advocacy group arrived in baghdad on Saturday to plead for the release of Amercan hostage Jill Carroll, while an Iraqi officical urged American forces to free six detained Iraqi women in a bid to save he Journalist.

A deadline set by the kidnapper, who threatened to kill Carroll unless US forces releasedd all Iraqi women in military custody, passed late Friday with no word on her fate.

A delegation from the Council on American-Islamic Relations flew from neighboring Jordan in a bid to drum up some momentum for Carrolls release.The 28-year-old was abducted January, 7 in a tough west Baghdad neighborhood.

"We are the only people who have come from outside of Iraq o call for Jill's release and we are very hopeful they will hear out message on belhalf of American Musims,"
Nihad Awad, the groups exexcutive director said at a Baghdad International Airport, "Harming her will do (the kidnappers) no good at all. The only was is to release her.

Also Saturday, Deputy Justice Minister Busho Ibrahim Ali said Iraqi authorities have asked US authorities to release six of the nine women in US military custody.

"I am making some contacts with the American side to hasten their release because this action might help hastening the release of the kidnapped Journalist.

Muslims from Iraq and France have called for release of the Journalist, who has reported on the suffering of Iraqi's living under US occupation and a raging Insurgency fanned by mostly Sunni armed militants.