Wife of Briton held by ISIS renews plea for his release

The wife of British hostage Alan Henning has pleaded again to the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) for her husband’s release.

“We’ve not abandoned Alan and we continue in our attempts to communicate with you [ISIS],” said Barbara Henning on a video released by The Independent on Wednesday.

“Some say wrong time, wrong place. Alan [Henning] was volunteering with his Muslim friends to help the people of Syria. He was in the right place doing the right thing,” said Mrs. Henning.

After her first written plea went unanswered, Henning begged her husband’s captors to spare his life because he was in Syria on a humanitarian mission.

Alan Henning, a 47-year-old former cab driver in northern England and a father of two, traveled to Syria with a British humanitarian convoy to help refugees in the crisis-ridden country. He was reportedly abducted by ISIS fighters around Christmas last year.

“We are at a loss why those leading Islamic State [of Iraq and Syria (ISIS)] cannot open their hearts and minds to the truth about Alan’s humanitarian motives for going to Syria and why they continue to ignore the verdicts of their own justice system,” his wife said.

“Surely those who wish to be seen as a state will act in a statesmanlike way by showing mercy and providing clemency. I ask again, supported by the voices across the world, for ISIS to spare Alan’s life,” she added.

In a recent videotaped execution of British aid worker David Haines made public, an ISIS executioner threatened to kill Henning so long as the United States continued to attack the group in Iraq.