The four Christian peace activists are among seven Westerners who have been abducted in Iraq since Nov. 26. Others include another American, a German, and a Frenchman.
The second American was shown on a separate insurgent video broadcast on Al Jazeera. Yesterday, his brother in the United States identified the captive as Ronald Schulz, 40, an industrial electrician from Alaska.
The brief videotape of the Christian peacekeepers transmitted yesterday by Al Jazeera did not show faces of the two robed and shackled figures. However, still photos showed the two were Fox and Kember. The two other hostages were not shown.
The photos were provided by IntelCenter, a company based in Alexandria, Va., which describes itself as a contractor for the intelligence community, military, and law enforcement.
Fox and Kember were blindfolded, and the stills appeared to have been made from a more complete version of the video that Al Jazeera aired. Unlike the civilian clothing they were wearing in two earlier videos, this time the hostages were wearing orange jumpsuits.
In the tape, the two captives made statements condemning the US and British presence in Iraq. Both men were instructed to give their statements twice, which they did without reading a text because they were blindfolded, according to IntelCenter. As a result, each man's second statement was slightly different from his first.
''I'd like to offer my plea to the people of America, not the government of America, a plea for my release from captivity and also a plea for a release from captivity of all the people of Iraq who are also suffering the same fate," Fox said in the transcript, provided by IntelCenter. ''And that is the occupation of the American troops and the British troops which has brought me to this condition and has brought the Iraqi people to the condition they're in."
In his statement, Kember appealed to Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain.
''I ask Mr. Blair, the British government, and the British people to work both for my release and for the release of the Iraqi people from oppression."
A senior Iraqi official said yesterday that ''intelligence and security efforts" were under way to win the release of the Western hostages,
