Red Cross Releases Name Of Nurse Taken Hostage; New Zealand Fears For Her Safety
For years, New Zealand's government and international media worked to keep Louisa Akavi's name secret. Now the Red Cross hopes that releasing it will lead to information on her whereabouts.
For more than five years, New Zealand kept secret the name of a nurse considered a hostage of the Islamic State.
Now Louisa Akavi's name is public.
The International Committee of the Red Cross hopes that releasing her name will lead to her rescue. But New Zealand's government sees it as a threat to her safety, Foreign Minister Winston Peters made clear on Tuesday.
Following Akavi's kidnapping in 2013 while she was working for the ICRC in Syria, news outlets around the world withheld her name and nationality. That changed on Sunday, after the ICRC for information on her whereabouts, using her name and sparking a back-and-forth between the humanitarian institution and New Zealand.
