Al Qaeda extends deadline on Austrian hostages.

Update: Qaradawi urges al Qaeda's North Africa wing on Sunday to free two Austrian hostages

"I urge you in the name of God, Islam, the Koran and the interest of the (Islamic) nation to free the two hostages for the sake of the dignity of this religion," Egyptian scholar Youssef al-Qaradawi said on Al Jazeera television.

In his televised message, Qaradawi told the captors that Islam bans taking innocent people as hostages to apply pressure on others. "They have no guilt. They are innocent civilians used to punish others or apply pressure on them. In Islam people are only responsible for what they do individually," said Qaradawi, who is based in Qatar. I urge the captors, our brothers and sons, to let them go," he said. "Austria has a good stance on Islam."

It sounds like they are haggling over a used car.

Hostage-takers who seized two Austrian tourists last month in Tunisia have extended a deadline for their demands to be met, Austria's Foreign Ministry said Sunday.
Austria was in possession of a message «making more time available for efforts to free Wolfgang Ebner and Andrea Kloiber,» said ministry spokesman Peter Launsky-Tieffenthal.

The spokesman did not specify where the message had come from or say if a new deadline was set.

I will say that 5 million Euros will go a long way in establishing a foothold for Al Qaeda in their latest version of the terrorist rathole, Africa.

And is this the conduit they are using to negotiate with these dirty rotten terror scum?

Earlier Sunday, the ministry said a former Austrian ambassador recently met with the president of Mali to personally inform him about the case.

The real crime? The Malian Military know exactly where the hostages are.

A senior Malian military officer confirmed information reported by an Algerian Web site, Ennahar, which said that the two hostages were being held captive in northern Mali.

"Intelligence shows their presence in Malian territory, in the Kidal region, more precisely in the Tegargar sector," the officer, who asked not to be named, told Reuters.

Please. I beg of you. If I ever get taken hostage by these dogs send missiles and Marines...do not send a former ambassador to horse trade with the terrorist enabler President of some third world country. And for God's sake, don't send any of those nutjob Libyans either.

Add in Algeria and Libya and you've got a picture of what's going on. Nations like Algeria and Libya enabling terrorism by facilitating their acquisition of blood money.

In neighbouring Algeria, security sources said Austria had accepted the principle of paying a ransom and discussions were focused around the sum of five million euros.

Libya had agreed to act as an intermediary to help finalise the deal, using its influence with a local Tuareg tribe known as El Barabich, the security sources said.

More on the negotiations and location of the hostages beneath the fold.


Being held in a well-known ISLAMIST hideout.

The Malian officer said the zone where the two captives were being held was a well-known Islamist hideout."The area from Tessalit to Kidal has become a fiefdom of the Islamists. They know the geography, which is vast and difficult to control. You can find bearded Salafist Islamists of all kinds there, from Pakistan, Afghanistan and the Maghreb," he said.

Austria's Plassnik did not name the senior diplomat sent to Mali but some Algerian media reports said it was Anton Prohaska, a former ambassador to France.

The Web site of Ennahar said the captives were being held by a group led by Algerian militant Abdelhamid abu Zeid at an al Qaeda base about 150 km (95 miles) from Kidal town in Mali.