An Egyptian tour guide has threatened to start the killing four German tourists he is holding hostage if his estranged German wife does not hand over custody of his sons, reported AFP, citing police officials as saying Wednesday.
"If I don't see my children at Luxor airport, I will not free the Germans, and I might even kill them," an Egyptian policeman quoted the abductor as saying in a telephone conversation with the German authorities.
Ibrahim Said Moussa, a guide with the Express Travel Agency, has been holding four Germans since Monday in a bid to win custody of his two sons, who are reported to be in Germany with his estranged wife, said reports.
The kidnapper was quoted by Scotsman online news service as telling Abu Dhabi television that the four had volunteered to help him recover his children and were free to move around.
An interior ministry statement named those held as Marco Vidkind, Ralph Laver, Kristof Paning and Peter Nowotnick, saying that they had arrived in Egypt on March 6th, reported the online service.
"On March 12th, the German embassy received a telephone call from Moussa, in which he said that he had kidnapped four German tourists in Luxor and threatened not to release them until his children Kerim and Rami, who are in Germany with his German wife Heike Ritter, are returned," it said.
The statement said the couple had married in 1991 and lived north of Cairo. Ritter left for Germany about 18 months ago after obtaining German passports for the children without Moussa’s permission.
It said the German embassy had turned down visa requests made by the husband, who wanted to visit his children, according to Scotsman.
Egyptian state television news said security forces were going to deal with the matter "in a way that would guarantee the safety of the hostages."
A Luxor security source told the news service that the hostages were being held at a house in El Karnak, site of an enormous Pharaonic temple just north of Luxor.
The source said state security forces were negotiating with the man, said Scotsman – Albawaba.com
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