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Posted Sunday, April 29th, 2012 at 4:45 pm
VOA The beheaded body of a British Red Cross doctor was found by the
roadside in southwestern Pakistan Sunday, nearly four months after he
was kidnapped by suspected militants.
Police in Quetta, the capital of insurgency-hit Baluchistan province,
said a note was found with the body in which the Pakistani Taliban
claimed responsibility, saying the doctor had been killed because a
ransom had not been paid. Red Cross officials said 60-year-old Khalil Rasjed Dale had been
managing a health program in Quetta, located near the Afghan border, for
almost a year when he was kidnapped on January 5. The Red Cross operates
clinics in the city that treat people wounded in the war in Afghanistan. Dale had worked for the Red Cross for years, carrying out assignments in
Somalia, Afghanistan and Iraq before coming to Pakistan. The director-general of the International Committee of the Red Cross,
Yves Daccord, condemned the "barbaric act." He said "all of us at the
ICRC and at the British Red Cross share the grief and outrage of
Khalil's family and friends." British Foreign Secretary William Hague said this was a "senseless and
cruel act, targeting someone whose role was to help the people of
Pakistan." He said London had been working tirelessly to secure Dale's
release. The Pakistani government also condemned the killing and vowed to "bring
the perpetrators of this heinous crime to justice." Also Sunday, U.S. drone strikes killed four suspected militants and
wounded at least two others in the restive North Waziristan tribal
region bordering Afghanistan. The strike came as Washington is trying to rebuild diplomatic relations
with Islamabad, badly frayed after a cross-border coalition attack
mistakenly killed 24 Pakistani troops near the Afghan border last
November. Pakistan subsequently shut down the ground supply route to
international troops in Afghanistan and demanded an end to U.S. drone
strikes, arguing that they are counter-productive because they kill
civilians, exacerbate anti-U.S. sentiment and violate sovereignty. Washington says the strikes are crucial to defeating al-Qaida and the
Taliban. http://blogs.voanews.com/breaking-news/2012/04/29/kidnapped-british-r...
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