Croatian hostage ‘killed by IS in Egypt’

Terror tracker SITE Intel Group’s head Rita Katz had tweeted a grab from the video which showed the Croatian man dressed in a faded yellow jumpsuit kneeling before a knife-weilding ISIS fighter in fatigues.

Sinai Province, an Islamic State affiliate based in Egypt, released a photo on its Twitter account that shows the Croatian hostage beheaded and included a caption charging Croatia with participating in the war on IS.

Speaking on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to talk to journalists, he said Salopek’s driver, who was left behind by the kidnappers, said the gunmen who seized the Croat on a highway west of Cairo had Bedouin accents.

The authenticity of the picture could not be immediately verified.

“It is with horror that I am learning about the announcement from the Daesh terrorist group of the execution of a Croatian hostage”, Fabius said in a statement, referring to ISIS by another name. When he was initially kidnapped, Sinai Province said it would release him if the Egyptian government released female political detainees.

There is no official confirmation that Tomislav Salopek has been murdered, but his abduction marks a new and risky development in Egypt’s evolving security situation.

The killing marked the first ISIS execution of a foreign captive in Egypt since the terrorist group arrived in the nation past year.

In Salopek’s home town, neighbours described him as a friendly young man who had gone to Egypt to earn a living.

The group now claims it has beheaded Salopek.

Croatia’s Foreign Ministry had said one of its citizens with the initials T.S. was kidnapped in Cairo on the same day on the way to work, and it was doing everything it could to resolve the situation.

He added that Croatia was “at the full disposal” of the Salopek family.

A video showing him reading out the militant group’s demands was published online last Wednesday. “… However, what we have seen… doesn’t look good”.

“No, no, no”, Goran Blazanovic kept repeating as he sat in the local cafe filled with pale and quiet guests who were switching from one news portal to another on their smartphone screens, looking for signs that would give them hope that the reports were mistaken.

The Croatian Prime Minister, Zoran Milanovic, also said that his government is in touch with foreign agencies and would try to obtain more information. Moreover the death of a foreign worker abducted in Egypt’s “mainland” undermines recent attempts by Egypt’s military-backed government to project an aura of security and renewal after years of unrest.

Within the aftermath of that strike, President Abdel Fattah Sisi vowed vengeance and hinted that the state may perform demise sentences already handed down towards Morsi and a whole lot of different members of his Muslim Brotherhood, though the Brotherhood had denied any position in Barakat’s killing or different assaults.