Ansar al-Sunnah Army Killed Akihiko Saito

Hironobu Saito, the younger brother of Japanese man Akihiko Saito

From the Guardian:

Japanese Man Says Brother Killed in Iraq

TOKYO (AP) - A Japanese man confirmed Saturday that his older brother, a security worker kidnapped in Iraq, was the dead man shown on an extremist Islamic militant group's Web site, an official said. Iraqi authorities immediately condemned the killing.

..."I've looked at the images and confirmed that it is my elder brother. At that point, I told Japanese police and the Foreign Ministry," Saito's younger brother, Hironobu, said in a statement released through the municipal government office in Chiba city, east of Tokyo.

In the first official confirmation of Saito's slaying, the Iraqi government said Saturday that efforts to secure Saito's release had failed. A spokesman, Rasha Ali, said the government's sources had confirmed the death.

"The Iraqi Minister of National Security, Abdul Karim al-Inizi, condemned the assassination of the Japanese hostage by his abductors," the government said in a statement.

...On Saturday, Japan's Foreign Ministry said it needed physical evidence - such as DNA or dental samples from Saito's body - to confirm the man's death. But a ministry official said the body was "very likely" Saito's, after his brother and employer, Britain's Hart Security Ltd., saw the pictures and had called the ministry with verification. Japanese police reached a similar conclusion, he said.

"From these pieces of information ... we have no choice but to think that it's Mr. Saito," the official said on condition of anonymity.

"However, we cannot confirm that just by looking at the Web site. As to the whereabouts of Mr. Saito, we still cannot confirm that," he said, adding that Tokyo was continuing its efforts.

...Earlier Saturday, Hironobu Saito had urged the country not to link the likelihood of his brother's death to the humanitarian mission in Iraq.

"Please don't view my brother as a representative of Japan in Iraq," Hironobu Saito said.
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Earlier this month, a man who worked with Saito at Hart in Baghdad and who survived the ambush desribed Saito as bleeding massively after being shot. He told Japanese officials he believed it was unlikely that he could have survived.

Although there is no information to confirm that Saito was never being held hostage, that he actually died from his wounds, the Ansar al-Sunnah Army claimed he was alive and in their custody.

What sort of animals kill a civilian and then allow his family to hold out hope that he may still be alive?

I'm glad the Iraqi government condemned the killing.

Now let's see the Arab streets fill with protestors condemning Saito's death and the brutality of the Ansar al-Sunnah Army.

Hironobu Saito had asked that no one connect his brother to Japan's humanitarian mission in Iraq. He was a civilian worker, not a Japanese representative.

Do you hear the outrage of the Arab world, swelling up in the Arab street? The silence is deafening.

My prayers go out to the family of Akihiko Saito, as well as the families of individuals being held hostage in Iraq.