Beirut Captors Say Frenchman Gets a Reprieve

A pro-Iranian Lebanese extremist group said Tuesday that it has granted a one-week reprieve on its death threat against a French hostage, citing “secret promises” by the French government and new appeals for mercy.

The statement, signed by the Revolutionary Justice Organization, was delivered to the An Nahar newspaper in Beirut shortly after two Shia Muslim leaders urged the captors to spare the life of Jean-Louis Normandin, a television crewman.

The handwritten statement acknowledged those appeals and also referred to “the secret promises that were presented by the French government to the concerned parties.”

‘Spilling Blood Would Begin’

However, the group also demanded that “delegations be sent within this week to present needed clarifications that could lead to improving things, or spilling blood would begin.”

Since Thursday, the group has issued two 48-hour deadlines for the killing of Normandin, the second of which expired Monday.

The group demands clarification of recent remarks by French President Francois Mitterrand that reiterated France’s backing for Iraq in the war against Iran and appeared to reject the possibility of a pardon for terrorist Anis Naccache.

The new statement again called on France to take “a neutral stand” in the Iran-Iraq War and declared, “The stubbornness and keenness on continuing the backing for Iraq with arms will be met with insistence to direct the harshest blows inside France so that France would pay a high price.”

Accused as Spy

The group said that Normandin, kidnaped in West Beirut on March 8, 1986, confessed that he supplied French and Israeli intelligence networks with “photographed information and documents.” It also accused France of taking a hard-line stand in behind-the-scenes talks, in which Algerian mediators were involved.

Earlier Tuesday, a bomb exploded near U.S.-affiliated Beirut University College as the wives of four teachers abducted from the campus Jan. 24 met with the commander of Syrian troops in the capital.

The blast wounded one person.