BAGHDAD, Iraq – A militant Iraqi group has beheaded one Nepalese kidnap victim and executed 11 others with bullets to the backs of their heads, in the worst carnage to date after a slew of kidnappings of foreigners in Iraq.

The group, calling itself Jaish Ansar al Sunna, posted gruesome still images and video showing the killing on a Web site Tuesday.

In the tape, the group said the men were working for a Jordanian company in Iraq and said they killed them for working with the United States against Islam.

The killings, carried out apparently without the group issuing any demands or deadlines, are certain to further chill the atmosphere for foreigners working in the country.

Nepal’s ambassador to Qatar, Somananda Suman, confirmed the deaths in an interview on al Jazeera television Tuesday night.

The French government rallied the Islamic world to help obtain the release of two French journalists who were kidnapped last week, Christian Chesnot with Radio France International and Georges Malbrunot with the newspaper Le Figaro. Both are veteran reporters of Iraq and speak fluent Arabic.

Late Tuesday night, the Arab League said the so-called Islamic Army in Iraq, which is holding the journalists, extended its deadline until Wednesday night, the second deadline extension. The group is demanding that the French government repeal laws that ban wearing head scarves in schools.

The French appeal produced some results.

The Association for Muslim Scholars, an influential association of Iraqi Sunni Muslims with close ties to militant groups that are fighting the U.S. military presence, said Tuesday that killing the journalists wouldn’t help Muslims.

“Killing the hostages is going to isolate Iraq at a time when we need to gain the support of organizations,” said Mohammed Bashar al Fairthy, an association spokesman. “We are very annoyed by the scarf ban, but at the same time handling it like this is not to the benefit of Muslims in France.”

The Fallujah Mujahedeen Shura Council, an organization of Muslim leaders in Fallujah, released a statement saying: “Given France’s humanitarian stance toward the Iraq issue and its … demanding an end to American presence in Iraq … we appeal to our brothers in faith and arms in the Islamic Army to release the French journalists … .”

The Iranian government and German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer also condemned the kidnappings Tuesday.

According to a tape played Saturday by al Jazeera, the Islamic Army in Iraq said it would give the French government 48 hours to repeal a law banning children from wearing ostentatious religious symbols in school, which includes head scarves on Muslim girls.

On Monday, the group first extended the deadline, giving the French government another 24 hours to repeal the law. It also released a tape that showed the journalists pleading with the French government to repeal the law.

“We call on every French person and every person who values life to demonstrate against the head-scarf law,” Malbrunot said on Monday’s tape. “Our lives are in danger, and I appeal to President (Jacques) Chirac to do something and abolish this law.”

The French government held an emergency session, but has said it wouldn’t repeal the law, which is set to take effect Wednesday.

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In Baghdad, interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi met Tuesday with tribal leaders in Sadr City, a Baghdad slum dominated by rebel cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, and asked them to help stop the outbreak of violence. He said that if the fighting stopped, the government could spend millions to rebuild the neighborhood’s infrastructure.

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The forum lasted nearly three hours and included speeches by Allawi, four of his ministers and the mayor of Baghdad. It centered on the question of which would come first: an end to violence or reconstruction. The roughly 100 sheiks participating said the lack of jobs and resources was driving its frustrated community toward violence.

Allawi said elections scheduled for January would provide the means to express views, not violence.

“This is an interim government. After that, the Iraqi people will decide the type of leadership and government they want,” Allawi said.

The government has allocated $115 million to reconstruct Sadr City. Another $150 million could come from the United States and other allies, and several neighboring nations have donated another $20 million, the prime minister told the sheiks.

Dr. Dean Allwan, the minister of health, said millions were available to build health-care centers, but that when fighting started, the contractors left the project sites.

“We want to rehabilitate the health centers,” Allwan said. “There are daily security threats for those working in those centers. We are depending on you to help the health sector. I call upon you to help the security situation.”

A vast Shiite Muslim slum in Baghdad that provides the firebrand cleric al-Sadr with many of his recruits and supporters, Sadr City has been the site of almost nonstop outbreaks of violence. Most recently, on Saturday, 12 people were killed in a 24-hour period during a rash of fighting.

The community’s infrastructure was strained before the war, but has only become worse since.

Sheik Muhsin al-Mousawi said he was representing all the sheiks, and read a letter that spelled out what they would like to see.

He said the sheiks would like the multinational forces to withdraw and for the government to encourage the police to patrol the Sadr City neighborhood. The group asked the government to reconstruct Sadr City and compensate residents whose property “has suffered damage.”

Al-Mousawi said the sheiks also wanted more jobs in Sadr City, especially for the educated.

“We need to employ the young men in order to fill their spare time, which the saboteurs could make use of,” he said.

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(c) 2004, Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services.

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GRAPHICS (from KRT Graphics, 202-383-6064): 20040831 Iraq Nepalese and 20040831 Iraq reporters

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