British & Italian hostages murdered by captors in rescue bid in Nigeria

[CaptainNemo]

A British hostage has been killed in a Special Forces operation to free him from al-Qaeda aligned kidnappers in Nigeria.

By Matthew Holehouse

5:20PM GMT 08 Mar 2012



David Cameron named the man as Chris McManus who was killed with fellow hostage Italian Franco Lamolinara.

It is understood a Special Boat Service operation to free them from al-Qaeda aligned kidnappers failed.

The effort to free Mr McManus, from the North West of England, and an Italian hostage was launched by Nigerian forces with the assistance of the UK.

The Prime Minister said the pair appeared to have died at the hands of their captors, either before or during the course of the rescue bid.

Mr Cameron said: "The effort to free Chris McManus from the north west of England, and an Italian hostage was launched by Nigerian forces with the assistance of the UK.

"Chris McManus, a British citizen, was taken hostage by terrorists in Northern Nigeria in May 2011. He was taken hostage with his colleague, an Italian national, Franco Lamolinara.
"Since then, we have been working closely with the Nigerian authorities to try to find Chris and Franco, and to secure their release.
"The terrorists holding the two hostages made very clear threats to take their lives, including in a video that was posted on the internet.
"After months of not knowing where they were being held, we received credible information about their location.
"A window of opportunity arose to secure their release.
"We also had reason to believe that their lives were under imminent and growing danger.
"Preparations were made to mount an operation to attempt to rescue Chris and Franco. Together with the Nigerian Government, today I authorised it to go ahead, with UK support.
"It is with great regret that I have to say that both Chris and Franco have lost their lives. We are still awaiting confirmation of the details, but the early indications are clear that both men were murdered by their captors, before they could be rescued.
"Our immediate thoughts must be with Chris and Franco's families, and we offer them our sincerest condolences.
"Both families have endured a terrible ordeal, and this is a devastating moment for all of them.
"The Foreign Office have been in regular contact with the McManus family since Chris's capture. I spoke to them just before Christmas and I have spoken to them again with the news this afternoon.
Mr Cameron thanks President Jonathan of Nigeria for their work and paid tribute to the UK forces who worked to bring them home.
He added: "Terrorism and appalling crimes such as these are a scourge on our world. No-one should be in any doubt about our determination to fight and to defeat them."
It was launched after the UK received credible information about their whereabouts and that their lives were under increasing threat, a spokeswoman said.
Prime Minister Mario Monti was informed of the conclusion to the hostage situation by British PM Cameron in personal telehone call.
It is understood between 16 and 20 SBS commandos were involved in the Nigerian-lead operation. All British forces are safe.
The two men, who were working for an Italian building firm, were taken from a compound in Bernin Kebbi in the north of Nigeria in May 2011.

In August a Nigerian group calling itself 'Al Qaeda in the land beyond the Sahil' announced it had captured a British man.
It released a hostage video to a Mauritius news agency. It showed a blindfolded and bearded man in an red shirt, alongside three men in dark clothing armed with Kalashnikov rifles and a machete.
The man asked the British Government to answer the demands of the group to save his life. He called on the British people to pressurise the Government into acting, so that he could return to his family, according to Shura al Mujahideen fee Junubu Afarika, a South African Islamist website.
One of the kidnappers said it would be the "last message" issued to Mr Cameron about the hostage. The speaker said the British government had failed to answer their demands and it was given two weeks to "take the correct decision."

How convenient. How on earth can you possibly prove that it wasn't a stray bullet by a trigger happy soldier?! As if there's ever going to be a credible investigation.

Now terrorism has a brand name... "Oh we fucked up", "no, no! it was al qaeda/boka haram/al shabab/skeletor/mumm-ra/the daleks"

It just smacks of the lamest most transparent cover-up propaganda... the way the newspaper just casually announces that it was caused by a made-up branded terrorist appreciation society.

How thick do they suppose the public are?

Those boys were certainly thick to go for a lucrative contract in a lawless part of the world, managed by an evidently ropey Italian company.

It's never worth the money... never!

[harrybarracuda]

Total cluster fuck.

[sabang]

Hostage rescue is a high risk mission- not all attempts succeed. But it's either that or cave in to blackmail.

[CaptainNemo]

...or organise and pay for security properly in the first place, if you must get involved in engineering projects in monkey land.

[kmart]

...or organise and pay for security properly in the first place, if you must get involved in engineering projects in monkey land.

It was bad there twenty years ago. Now no amount of money could get me back to mainland Nigeria. They have even been cases of abduction from the offshore installations recently as well. No thanks.

[harrybarracuda]

As Entebbe and the Bin Laden op showed, you're better off excluding the fucking local chimps and just going in there and doing it yourself.

Sort out the diplomatic feather spitting later.

[Davis Knowlton]

It was just a matter of time before one of these rescue ops went bad. There will be more. The scum are looking for raids now, and will kill their captives at the sound of a distant rotor blade.

And "arry is quite right, keep the monkey locals out of it - totally. When I was working in a very dangerous part of country X, when I joined the team, many were wearing t-shirts with DNR in big letters on the front or back. Wondering why they were wearing "Do Not Resuscitate" shirts, I asked. Turned out to stand for "DO NOT RESCUE", as that country had a perfect score of 100% dead in hostage rescues.

[Rural Surin]

Africa is already becoming a covert and propagandized vocal point for world powers.

All the new wars that were regional are becoming global.

[Thaihome]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...-compound.html
British hostage murder: SBS moved quickly but hostages were shot before they entered compound

When Christopher McManus went to work in the Nigerian city of Birnin Kebbi, he may have thought he was relatively safe from the turmoil that scars other parts of Africa’s most populous country.


Image 1 of 2
Birnin Kebbi, Kebbi state, northern Nigeria Photo: MARTIN GODWIN



Image 1 of 2
Christopher McManus Photo: FCO

By Thomas Harding, and James Kirkup

9:28PM GMT 08 Mar 2012


Birnin Kebbi is the capital of Kebbi state, in the country’s north west and far from its oil-rich southern delta, where cash-driven kidnappings of Western workers are an occupational hazard.

And unlike many Westerners in Nigeria, Mr McManus was not involved in oil but in construction, as an engineer. His company, B Stabilini, was founded by Italians but has extensive Nigerian involvement: one of its directors is a Nigerian prince. It had been contracted to build an office for the Central Bank of Nigeria.

But Kebbi borders Niger, where Al-Qaeda in the Magreb is active. In 2009, its members abducted a group of Western nationals, including Edwin Dyer, a Briton, who was murdered six months later.

On the night of May 12 last year, Mr McManus and his Italian colleague, Franco Lamolinara, were in their apartment with two other colleagues, a German and a Nigerian.

According to the Nigerian police, the apartment was stormed by “a horde of gunmen”. In confused, violent scenes, the German escaped, while the Nigerian was shot and wounded. Mr McManus and Mr Lamolinara were abducted.

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Three days later, members of the Vinelife church in Manchester were asked to pray for Mr McManus, who was a “family friend” of a prayer leader at the church, and his colleague.


For more than two months, prayer was all that the church had to go on. During that time, neither the Nigerian nor British authorities had any firm intelligence about the fate of the hostages. Indeed, it was not even certain that the two men were still alive.

One detail of the abduction was particularly troubling: the two men had kept a large amount of cash in their apartment but it was ignored by the abductors.
That was seen as an ominous sign that whoever had taken Mr McManus and Mr Lamolinara was motivated by something other than money, but the picture remained worryingly unclear.

Then, in early August, a video was sent to a French news agency in Lagos. Barely a minute long, it showed the two men, bearded and blindfolded, kneeling before men carrying automatic weapons.

In the film, Mr McManus asked the British Government “to meet the demands of al-Qaeda”, but, significantly, there was no demand for money.


The tape deepened British officials’ fears that the men were in the hands of Boko Haram, regarded as hardcore Islamists linked to al-Qaeda. “We’re not talking about Somali pirates or ransom gangs. These guys are ideologically-driven Islamists, part of the international AQ network,” said a British source.

Following the appearance of the video, Whitehall’s Cobra committee, which oversees national security operations, met to consider the kidnapping. In all, the committee discussed the case about 20 times, initially chaired by civil servants but later overseen by senior ministers, including David Cameron.

In early December, a second video was released in which the hostage-takers declared that Mr Cameron had two weeks to authorise “negotiations” . What would be the subject of talks was not clear — the group made no clear demands.
But they were clear about one thing: if that vague condition was not met, the hostages would be killed.

Despite the threat, the Government, in agreement with Italy and Nigeria, decided to let the deadline pass because intelligence officials assessed that it was a “bit of macabre theatre” rather than a serious threat. But it did add urgency to the task of locating the hostages.

It is understood that Nigerian intelligence officials tracked the group to the city of Sokoto, about 100 miles north-east of Birnin Kebbi. GCHQ, Britain’s signals intelligence service, was also at work, identifying and monitoring the telephone calls of the gang.

Once they were located, the option of using British special forces to attempt a rescue became a viable option for Mr Cameron.

Two weeks ago, a Squadron Group of the Special Boat Service deployed to Nigeria. The SBS was chosen to carry out the mission as it was the “Stand-By Squadron” for counter-terrorism. The post is rotated through the four SAS and four SBS squadrons every six months.

In all, about 40 British special forces personnel went to Nigeria, travelling in civilian clothes and aboard commercial airlines, their weapons and gear shipped in British diplomatic bags. The commanding officer of the SBS, which recruits almost exclusively from the Royal Marines, set up his Task Group Headquarters at the British Embassy in Lagos.

As well as intercepted telephone calls, the SBS also had access to surveillance video of the house where the hostages were being held from aircraft flying over the city. Images were fed back to the SBS command post and the monitor screens of the Cobra briefing room in Whitehall.

For days, the SBS and their Nigerian counterparts watched, and waited. On Wednesday, what officials called “a window of opportunity” opened. Intercepts of mobile phone calls disclosed that the terrorists were about to move and then kill their hostages.

The local SBS commander briefed his chief, the Director of Special Forces, a major-general who is both one of the most admired combat commanders in the Army and a personal friend of the Prime Minister. He judged that the situation was now “go, no-go”, meaning intervention was required. That judgment was endorsed by the Prime Minister, who gave the final authorisation on Thursday after an 8am Cobra meeting.

Conventional planning would prefer an assault at night, preferably just before dawn. But for reasons that remain unclear, the SBS was forced to make a daylight assault.

In a sign of haste, insiders said the soldiers carried out an “emergency response” plan, rather than the more comprehensive “deliberate response” plan.
The SBS team travelled in trucks close to the hostage site in a shanty town, beginning the raid at 11am Nigerian time.

“The security agencies tried to break into the house but there was resistance,” said Mahmoud Abubakar, who lives on the same street. “The people inside were shooting at them and they returned fire. They exchanged fire for some time.”
At least two terrorists were shot dead at this stage but for all the speed and training of the British forces, it was not enough.

When the terrorists in the room with the hostages heard the gunfire they shot both Mr McManus and Mr Lamolinara in the head at close range.

A senior official at Nigeria’s State Security Service said: “The hostage-takers shot the hostages before they [the Special Forces] even entered the compound. All the terrorists have been killed as well.”

[hazz]

just been listening to this on the radio and the Italian government is not happy at all, they feel that they were not kept informed about what was going on.

I am a little surprised that they bothered to kidnap a brit, I thought that it was well known that its been uk government policy since the early 1970's that if you are kidnapped and the kidnappers want to negotiate with the uk government the only outcomes are going to be the death or surrender of the kidnappers and if you die in the process, thats unfortunate.

Its not a nice stance and I would hate to find myself in it, but as soon as you make kidnap a useful tool, it rapidly gets out of control.

[CaptainNemo]

In Loving Memory of Chris & Franco


RIP from all your friends at B.Stabilini & Co. Ltd

source: Home - B. Stabilini & Co. Ltd

Still hiring...

[Lostandfound]

I was 131 days as a human shield hostage in Iraq in 1990. Most of the time in a room above the turbine hall of a dam awaiting execution when the ineviatbel coalition invasion happened or being bombed as collateral damage in the "liberation".

There are no words to describe how it feels to be deprived of your most basic freedoms to life and liberty. I can only say how how I empathise with what they suffered. If it's of any comfort to those that now grieve for them, one thing is certain. If they lived long enough to hear the gunshots of their would be liberators it was without any doubt a moment of absolute euphoria for them to know they had not been forgotten and that there was hope.

Hope is a rare and very precious commodity where they were. It's so very sad that they didn't make it. RIP.

[dobella]

I was 131 days as a human shield hostage in Iraq in 1990. Most of the time in a room above the turbine hall of a dam awaiting execution when the ineviatbel coalition invasion happened or being bombed as collateral damage in the "liberation".

There are no words to describe how it feels to be deprived of your most basic freedoms to life and liberty. I can only say how how I empathise with what they suffered. If it's of any comfort to those that now grieve for them, one thing is certain. If they lived long enough to hear the gunshots of their would be liberators it was without any doubt a moment of absolute euphoria for them to know they had not been forgotten and that there was hope.

Hope is a rare and very precious commodity where they were. It's so very sad that they didn't make it. RIP.

I was lucky on that occasion, worked 18 months on Iraq's Mina Al-Bakr oil terminal and thankfully we completed the contract for Brown and Root just 3 weeks before Saddam invaded Kuwait.
We left behind a skeleton crew just to tidy things up and the Iraqi's used them as human shields too.

[Lostandfound]

^ did they return to work ok afterwards?

[bsnub]

beginning the raid at 11am Nigerian time.

Major mistake here. Raids like this should be conducted before dawn if possible. To attack at midday is just asking for trouble.

[harrybarracuda]

beginning the raid at 11am Nigerian time.

Major mistake here. Raids like this should be conducted before dawn if possible. To attack at midday is just asking for trouble.

I think the whole point was that they had to move quickly. Allegedly, they'd been told the hostages were due to be moved or killed imminently.

Either way, The Nigerians probably had the "intelligence" a week before, you just can't trust these simians to do the job properly.

[nostromo]

beginning the raid at 11am Nigerian time.

Major mistake here. Raids like this should be conducted before dawn if possible. To attack at midday is just asking for trouble.

Very good, but you can not choose your time in war. UK armed forces unit went in as soon as the situation was known which was very quick, but still the people were killed before that. They did make an effort to save people when there still was evidence they were alive. No time to "consult, wait for advice" some euro italian politicians (hope and know it stays this way). Italians/euros "might" have leaked the info to... anyways.

[billy the kid]

seems to have been some conflict between
the brits and itals on how to handle these situations
brits don't do deals with terrorists
and the itals don't mind paying a ransom.

[hazz]

^which is probably why they got left out of the decisions

[harrybarracuda]

seems to have been some conflict between
the brits and itals on how to handle these situations
brits don't do deals with terrorists
and the itals don't mind paying a ransom.

The wops are skint, Europe has been handing out cash to them for months.

So fuck them giving it away to the darkies.

[Mr Gribbs]

The Italians are rightfully livid, who tries to pull an operation like this in the middle of the day? Fucking cowboys!

[hazz]

Whilst I would agree the italians have every right to be pissed, given the background of the people involved in the reuse attempt, I would rather see some evidence beyond the hostages being dead and the timing, that suggests that these guys were cowboys. We are told that this team had been in nigeria for a while and the decision for them to go in at this particular time was that it was believed that the hostages were about to be killed, under those circumstances its quite believable that when they arrived they found a situation where by not acting immediately the hostages would be dead. This would justify their actions.

[nostromo]

Now this is false information:

[QUOTE=CaptainNemo;2038769]

A British hostage has been killed in a Special Forces operation to free him from al-Qaeda aligned kidnappers in Nigeria.

UK Forces came to the scene after hostages were already killed. Hostages were not killed in operation. There was a change of saving them by moving fast. But unfortunately they had been killed. Dont see what Italians are whining about. Domestic politics probably.

[DrAndy]

The effort to free Mr McManus, from the North West of England

I know, Manchester is awful

As Entebbe and the Bin Laden op showed, you're better off excluding the fucking local chimps and just going in there and doing it yourself.

well, in this case, obviously not, it seems a real fukup

[DrAndy]

UK Forces came to the scene after hostages were already killed

how do you know that? yes, they were dead when they got in but for how long, 1 minute, or a few hours?