Islamic
State released a video on Sunday that appeared to show the beheadings of 21
Egyptian Christians in Libya
Egypt's state news
agency MENA quoted the spokesman for the Coptic Church as confirming that 21
Egyptian Christians believed to be held by Islamic State were dead.
The footage showing the
deaths of the Egyptians appeared on the Twitter feed of a website that supports
Islamic State, which has seized parts of Iraq and Syria and
has also beheaded Western hostages.
In the video, militants
in black marched the captives, dressed in orange jump suits, to a beach the
group said was near Tripoli. They were forced down onto their knees, then
beheaded.
A caption on the
five-minute video read: "The people of the cross, followers of the hostile
Egyptian church." Before the killings, one of the militants stood with a
knife in his hand and said: "Safety for you crusaders is something you can
only wish for."
Thousands of Egyptians
desperate for work have traveled to Libya since an uprising at home
in 2011, despite advice from their government not to go to a country sliding
into lawlessness.
The Coptic Church said
it was confident the government would seek justice. Al Azhar, the center of
Islamic learning in Egypt, said no religion would accept such
"barbaric" acts.
The families of the kidnapped
workers had urged Cairo to help secure their release. In the mostly
impoverished southerly Minya Governorate, relatives screamed and fainted upon
hearing news of the deaths.
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