London: A new propaganda video featuring a British photojournalist captured almost two years ago by Islamic State group in Syria, reading scripted messages has been released by the dreaded terrorist outfit.
John Cantlie, 43, read an apparently scripted message, criticising the approach of the UK and US on hostage negotiations. The journalist also read emails reportedly exchanged between IS and the families of hostages.
The video comes just days after his 80-year-old father, Paul Cantlie, died from complications following pneumonia. He appears in the fifth instalment of a series entitled “Lend Me Your Ears”, sitting behind a desk wearing an orange jumpsuit.
He says: “Now, unless we tried something stupid like escaping or doing something we shouldn’t, we were treated well by the Islamic State.”
“Some of us who tried to escape were waterboarded by our captors, as Muslim prisoners are waterboarded by their US captors.”
British volunteers feel sharp edge of Islamic State sword
Muslim extremists from Britain, who went to Syria and Iraq to fight alongside the IS are now desperate to return home but are facing death threats from the militant group’s top leaders, a media report said.
“There are Britons who, upon wanting to leave, have been threatened with death, either directly or indirectly,” the Guardian reported.
The report comes after the killing of a Muslim from Portsmouth on the frontline in Syria, the fourth to die from a group of six men known as the “Pompey lads’ who travelled to fight for IS.
Muhammad Mehdi Hassan, 19, is understood to have died on Friday during the IS offensive to capture the Syrian border city of Kobani. Hassan was part of a group of five calling themselves the Britani Brigade Bangladeshi Bad Boys.
