An important supply route for the US military in Iraq was in jeopardy on Monday after Turkish truck owners announced that they were suspending trips into the country in an attempt to secure the release of two drivers held hostage by armed kidnappers.
The decision to stop the 200 daily deliveries coincided with the release of a videotape on an Islamist Web site that showed the murder of a Turkish worker in Iraq.
The Turkish supply route is one of three relied upon by the US military, and is regarded as more secure for the convoys than the routes through Jordan or Kuwait.
Of the 2,000 trucks that cross daily from the north, about one-tenth carry vital supplies such as petrol and jet fuel to US forces.
But over the past few months, several Turkish drivers have been attacked, killed or taken hostage.
Men claiming to be from a militant group led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi said on Saturday that they had captured two Turkish truck drivers, and demanded that the men's employers leave Iraq.
In a tape shown on the Arab satellite channel al Jazeera, masked men threatened to behead the two drivers unless their Turkish employers complied with the kidnappers' demands.
In a statement, the Istanbul-based International Transporters' Association said: "Within the framework of current developments, [we] decided to stop the transport of cargo which belong to the American troops in Iraq as of Monday."
In the video broadcast yesterday, a Turkish man, Murat Yuce, was shot in the head by one of three masked men after a statement was read in Turkish.
It said: "I have a word of advice for any Turk who wants to come to Iraq to work. You don't have to hold a gun to be aiding the occupying United States ... Turkish companies should withdraw from Iraq."
In Ankara, the Bilintur company, which provides a laundry service for a Jordanian company in Iraq, said Yuce was one of two employees missing in Iraq for three or four days.
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