AFP, Tokyo :
The clock was ticking on Thursday towards a deadline imposed by Islamist militants threatening to kill two Japanese nationals unless Tokyo pays a $200 million ransom.
The Japanese government said it was working to secure the release of freelance journalist Kenji Goto and self-employed contractor Haruna Yukawa, but with only 24 hours to go, admitted it had still not spoken to the Islamic State group.
“We have not been able to confirm their safety,” Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga told a press conference.
Jihadist footage posted online Tuesday showed a knife-wielding militant looming over two kneeling Japanese men, apparently in a desert in Syria or Iraq.
In a chilling echo of the group’s videotaped beheadings of five western hostages last year, the man, who speaks English with a British accent, says the two captives’ fate hangs in the balance.
The clock was ticking on Thursday towards a deadline imposed by Islamist militants threatening to kill two Japanese nationals unless Tokyo pays a $200 million ransom.
The Japanese government said it was working to secure the release of freelance journalist Kenji Goto and self-employed contractor Haruna Yukawa, but with only 24 hours to go, admitted it had still not spoken to the Islamic State group.
“We have not been able to confirm their safety,” Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga told a press conference.
Jihadist footage posted online Tuesday showed a knife-wielding militant looming over two kneeling Japanese men, apparently in a desert in Syria or Iraq.
In a chilling echo of the group’s videotaped beheadings of five western hostages last year, the man, who speaks English with a British accent, says the two captives’ fate hangs in the balance.
