Abducted Australian football coach in Yemen pleas to government to pay ransom
A 24-second video of Australian hostage Craig Bruce McAllister has been released on the internet after his abduction last month in Yemen. In the video, he has begged the government to pay the ransom that his captors have been asking for his release.
"I have been working as a football coach ... At the moment I am kidnapped by a group here," McAllister said in the video . "They are requesting that the Australian government send the money they have requested."
McAllister had overseen training at the Al Ahli Football Club before he disappeared.
"We do understand that an Australian who has been in Yemen for some time has been kidnapped, but we don't know the details," Foreign Minister Julie Bishop told Sky News. She said that her department has been working hard to verify additional information.
According to Abdullah al-Maghribi, McAllister's assistant, in the Yemeni Scene news website (via the West Australian), McAllister worked as a coach for four years on al-Ahli Taizz in southern Yemen. For two years, he had been coaching for U-16 players at the al-Ahli Sanaa football club. Al-Maghribi also revealed that an Islamist group is responsible for the abduction. However, he has not identified a specific group. He begged the captors to release his boss.
McAllister, 56, works with a charitable Christian group devoted to humanitarian work in Asia and Europe. He spent seven years in Yemen but moved to Sanaa when the war broke.
Since March 2014, a war had been storming in Yemen. The alliance of Houthis , Iran and rouge army units has raged the capital. It has prompted the Saudi-led coalition to get involved in the war. It also has pushed the internationally recognised government into exile.
Last week, two unidentified Americans who were held in Yemen were released.
Yazeed Al Jeddawy, a Yemenist journalist, shared a link to the 24-second video on his Twitter account but Youtube has removed it because of its violation On the video-sharing website's terms of service.
