Negotiations between Egyptian security officials and the Bedouin Germi Abu-Msouh, who kidnapped at gunpoint two American tourists and their Egyptian tour guide last Friday and attempted to use them as bargaining chips for the release of his detained uncle, have stalled
Negotiations between Egyptian security officials and the Bedouin Germi Abu-Msouh, who kidnapped at gunpoint two American tourists and their Egyptian tour guide last Friday and attempted to use them as bargaining chips for the release of his detained uncle, have stalled.
The two American tourists and their Egyptian guide were kidnapped from the area of Nakhl in South Sinai while travelling on a bus on the Cairo Taba road. The bus was stopped by three cars. Armed, masked men disembarked and took the 61-year-old American pastor Michel Louis, an American woman and the tour guide who was accompanying them. Germi and his clan later announced they were holding the tourists and guide hostages till the Egyptian authorities release Germi’s 62-year-old uncle who is being held by the police in Alexandria for dealing in drugs.
Now that the two-day negotiations between Germi and the security authorities have stalled, the kidnapper has called on the US embassy in Cairo to pressure the Egyptian authorities to give in to his demands, in order to secure the release of the hostages.
A security source says the matter is in the hands of the political authorities in Cairo. They may decide to play for time, give in to the kidnappers, or order special forces to a rescue operation.
WATANI International
16 July 2012