7 KIDNAPPED SETRACO STAFF REPORTED DEAD

A couple of weeks ago, I brought you a report of  7 foreign SETRACO staff being kidnapped on duty.
Britain, Italy and Greece on Sunday said that a claim by a Nigerian Islamist group that it had killed seven foreign hostages appeared to be true, while London denied it had sought to stage a rescue.

Islamist group Ansaru said in its statement announcing the deaths on Saturday that it carried out the executions in part because British planes had arrived in Nigeria in recent weeks to attempt a rescue, citing local media reports.
 The hostages were four Lebanese, one Briton, a Greek citizen and an Italian.
But Britain’s defence ministry said there had been no rescue attempt and suggested the planes were in Nigeria to transport troops for the military effort in nearby Mali.

Ansaru on Saturday announced the deaths of all the expatriates abducted from a construction site of Lebanese-owned company Setraco on February 16 in Bauchi state in Nigeria’s north. They backed up their claim by showing video footages of the dead hostages.

British Foreign Secretary William Hague said all the hostages were “likely to have been killed” by their captors.

– ‘Heinous act’ –

“This was an act of cold-blooded murder, which I condemn in the strongest terms,” he said, expressing his determination to work with the Nigerian authorities “to hold the perpetrators of this heinous act to account, and to combat the terrorism which so blights the lives of people in northern Nigeria and in the wider region.” 
The Greek and Italian ministries also expressed their displeasure at the barbaric act.