Kidnapped Aid Worker Pleads for Her Life in Video

Margaret Hassan, the British-born humanitarian aid worker who was abducted earlier this week on her way to work in Baghdad, was shown on videotape today making a tearful plea for her life and asking the British government to withdraw troops from Iraq.

It was the first time the director of the CARE humanitarian group’s Iraq office has been heard from since her driver and companion were overpowered and Hassan pulled from the car on Tuesday.

In a video broadcast first on Arab satellite network Al Jazeera, Hassan implored British Prime Minister Tony Blair to withdraw forces from Iraq. Appearing distressed, she buried her head in her hands at one point as she repeated several times: “Please help me.”

The tape was broadcast one day after Britain agreed to a U.S. request to redeploy 805 British troops from Iraq’s relatively quiet south to an area of heavy insurgent fighting near Baghdad. The troop movement will free up additional U.S. forces for a planned offensive to wrest control of the guerrilla stronghold of Fallouja in preparation for the national elections scheduled for January.

On the tape, Hassan also referred to another Briton, Kenneth Bigley, a contractor who was abducted and beheaded after he was shown on videotape pleading for his life. She said: “And maybe we will die like Mr. Bigley.”

Her husband has pleaded for her release, saying she had devoted her life to helping ordinary Iraqis and avoided involving herself in religious and political matters.

At a news conference Thursday, her husband, Tahseen Ali Hassan, said that no group had claimed responsibility for the abduction, one of many to target aid workers in recent months.

“I don’t have anything to say to the people responsible. Just release my wife; she is Iraqi and she’s working for a humanitarian organization,” said Ali Hassan, an Iraqi native.

Margaret Hassan, who was born in Ireland and is in her 60s, has lived in Iraq for more than 30 years with her husband and holds dual citizenship.

“She was aware of the fact that foreigners were being kidnapped all over Iraq, but she never thought about leaving the country,” Ali Hassan said. “It was her decision to make. She didn’t consider herself to be a foreigner.”

Morin reported from Baghdad, Daniszewski from London. Times Staff Writer Daryl Strickland contributed from Los Angeles.