Is this story connected to the theological green light that was just issued? From AP:
BAGHDAD, Iraq – A militant group holding two Pakistani contractors hostage said Wednesday it had killed the men but freed their Iraqi driver, the Al-Jazeera television station Al-Jazeera reported.
The group, calling itself the Islamic Army in Iraq, had announced in a video Monday that it kidnapped two Pakistanis working for U.S. forces and sentenced them to death because their country was discussing sending troops to Iraq.
In a new videotape sent to Al-Jazeera on Wednesday, the men said they had carried out their threat, the station reported. The newsreader said the video showed the corpses of the two men; however, the station declined to show the footage.
The kidnapped men were identified by Pakistan as engineer Raja Azad, 49, and driver Sajad Naeem, 29, both of whom worked for the Kuwait-based al-Tamimi group in Baghdad. The militants also warned the company to stop doing business in Iraq or they would kill more of its employees.