US interrogators tell ‘The Beatles’: show us the graves of your victims
TWO British jihadis who were part of the notorious ‘Beatles’ terror cell are being interrogated by US intelligence in the search for the bodies of the Western hostages murdered by IS.
US officials have said that Alexanda Kotey, 34, and El Shafee Elsheikh, 29 – who were captured by Kurdish forces – have given interrogators the ‘best breakthrough’ yet as to the burial sites of three Americans – James Foley, 40, Steven Sotlof, 31, and Peter Kassig, 31– and two British victims – David Haines, 44, and Alan Henning, 47 – almost four years after they were executed by fellow Briton Jihadi John.
A US official, who did not want to be named, said: ‘The two suspects have revealed clues about where the hostages are buried. But that may not be enough. The US wants to take the men back to the burial site areas so that they pinpoint the graves.’
This weekend, Pentagon officials said a team of ‘forensic and law enforcement experts’ will be deployed to a site near Raqqa, IS’s former de facto capital, where the bodies of four of the victims were thought to be dumped. The fifth victim is thought to have been buried in a town of Dabiq, around 200 miles north of Raqqa.
Kotey and Elsheikh, both from West London, were captured by the Western-backed Syrian Defence Force (SDF) last month as they were fleeing Syria to Turkey disguised as refugees, according to US officials.
The SDF did not know the two Britons were part of the same cell led by Jihadi John, who was killed in a 2015 drone strike. But after interrogations by US officials, it was discovered that they were the last two members of the ‘Beatles’ gang, named thus because of their British accents.