Japan’s chief government spokesman Yoshihide Suga said today, Thursday, that the government was investigating reports that a Japanese journalist was being held hostage in Syria and faced a threat of execution.
Paris-based Reporters Without Borders said this week that information it obtained indicated an armed group was holding journalist Jumpei Yasuda hostage and had begun a countdown for an undisclosed ransom, threatening to execute him or sell him to another group if its demands were not met.
In a statement on its website, the organization said an armed group kidnapped Yasuda in July in an area controlled by al-Nusra Front, al-Qaeda’s Syrian branch, shortly after he entered Syria earlier that month.
Suga was answering a question at a press conference about the Reporters Without Borders statement.