The Islamic State in the Sinai Peninsula has reported killing a Croatian hostage after the deadline it issued for Egypt to comply with its demands expired. It is unclear if the hostage was killed today or last week, as the Islamic State’s deadline was set to expire after 48 hours.
On Aug. 5, the Islamic State’s Wilayat Sinai [Sinai Province] released a short video in which Tomislav Salopek, a Croatian employee of the France-based geophysical company CGG, said to the camera that he will be killed unless Egypt agreed to free Muslim women in Egyptian prisons. [See LWJ report, Islamic State in the Sinai threatens to kill Croatian hostage.]
Today, the Islamic State and its supporters have disseminated a photo online purporting to show Salopek’s decapitated body in the sands of the Sinai. The message that accompanies the photo says that he was killed “for his country’s participation in the war on the Islamic State after the deadline expired.” Video confirmation similar to other beheading videos the jihadist group has released has yet to be produced .
Before the release of the video and photo, the Islamic State had previously issued demands to the governments of the United States, Japan, and the United Kingdom before beheading hostages James Foley, Steven Sotloff, Haruna Yukawa, Kenji Goto Jogo, David Cawthorne Haines, Alan Henning, and Peter Kassig.
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