Body of Iraq security guard may be returned home

THE body of a Scottish hostage who was kidnapped in Iraq five years ago could be returned to the UK, according to reports.

Alan McMenemy, a security guard from Glasgow, was snatched by gunmen along with three other guards and an IT expert they were protecting in 2007.

The Foreign Office said it was working with the Iraqi authorities to bring the “horrendous ordeal” to a close.

The bodyguards’ protection target, Peter Moore, was released alive in December 2009, and the bodies of the three other guards were returned to Britain.

Alec MacLachlan, 30, from Llanelli, South Wales, Jason Swindlehurst, 38, from Skelmersdale, Lancashire, and Jason Creswell, 39, originally from Glasgow, were abducted with 36-year-old computer expert Mr Moore and Mr McMenemy, who was 34 at the time.

They were snatched by militants posing as police at the Iraqi finance ministry in May 2007.

The bodies of the three guards were passed to British authorities in Iraq in 2009. Mr Moore was released alive on 30 December the same year. The Foreign Office said: “We are aware of reports that Asaib Ahel al-Haq say they are prepared to return the body of Alan McMenemy, missing in Iraq since 2007.

“The uncertainty over Alan’s fate has been a source of great distress for his family. It has been a horrendous ordeal for everyone involved. We are working with the Iraqi authorities and others to bring this matter to resolution.”

A source working with the hostages’ families said: “The fact that this statement has been made from the leadership of the group means that it must be taken seriously, and we remain of course very eager to see the return of Alan to the UK.”

An inquest into the deaths of Mr McMenemy’s colleagues heard that the security guards collected Mr Moore from his accommodation in the green zone of Baghdad.

The hearing at Trowbridge, Wiltshire, in June last year heard that, on 29 May 2007, the armed guards escorted their charge to the ministry of finance where he was employed helping to install a financial IT system.

At about 11:40am, between 50 and 100 armed men, dressed in police and military uniforms, converged on the building and took the men, the inquest heard.

Mr Moore told Channel 4 News: “We’ve been waiting for the body for a long time. When I was released I was told that the body would be released with me, and obviously that never happened.

“So I’ve been waiting for the body to be released. It’s so long, it’s never going to go away from any of our lives. But it is important to move on.

“We don’t have to forget but we have to keep living, and this is the end of the chapter, sort of thing.

“It is the end of the book.”