Captive British journalist features in latest IS propaganda video

New Islamic State propaganda video released by IS-affiliated Aamaq news agency on Saturday features captive British journalist John Cantlie reporting from Iraq's Mosul.

MENA

2 min read

The New Arab & agencies

19 March, 2016

British photojournalist John Cantlie was kidnapped in Syria by IS in November 2012 [Getty]

British journalist John Cantlie, who is being held prisoner by the Islamic State group, appears in a new video released on Saturday, supposedly filmed in the militant group's Iraqi stronghold of Mosul.

In the latest instalment in a series of propaganda videos released by the IS-affiliated Aamaq news agency, Cantlie speaks to the camera in the style of a news report.

It is unclear when it was shot, but Cantlie last appeared in an IS video in early 2015.

In Saturday's video, a gaunt-looking Cantlie says he is in Mosul, IS' main city in northern Iraq.

Dressed in black and squinting in the sunshine, he is seen standing in front of a metal shack he describes as a media kiosk that distributed IS pamphlets, destroyed in an airstrike by a US-led coalition.

Speaking in English with Arabic subtitles, as in previous clips of the same style, Cantlie criticises and derides the US-led campaign launched in 2014 against IS.

He was kidnapped along with journalist James Foley in November 2012 in Syria while covering the war there.

Foley became the first of several hostages to be slain by the jihadists.

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Media rights watchdog Reporters Without Borders has condemned IS for its "cowardly" use of a hostage in a forced role to push the jihadists' propaganda.