March 14, 2006
by Chris Herlinger
Religion News Service

NEW YORK – The North American peace activist group Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) says it will continue its work in Iraq despite the murder of one of four team members abducted in January.

The body of American Quaker and CPT brigade member Tom Fox, 54, of Clear Brook, VA, was discovered in Baghdad on March 9 by U.S. troops. His death was announced the next day.

He apparently had been tortured before death, officials said. No reason has been given for his murder.

"Our work continues," Kryss Chupp, a spokeswoman for the peace activist organization, said in a March 13 interview.

The fate of the other three abductees is unknown. Chupp said the CPT will remain in Iraq "to greet our missing team members when they are released."

Despite Fox's murder, she said, the organization is hopeful that the other three – Norman Kember, 74, of Great Britain, and James Loney, 41, and Harmeet Singh Sooden, 32, both of Canada – will be released.

Fox and the others traveled to Baghdad in November to work with Iraqi peace groups in defense of Iraqi prison detainees and their families.

They were abducted on Nov. 26. A previously unknown group calling itself the Swords of Righteousness Brigades has claimed responsibility and threatened to kill the peace activists unless Iraqi detainees in U.S. and Iraqi prisons were immediately released.

The kidnapped activists have been seen on several videotapes, although the last one, broadcast on March 7, did not show Fox.

Fox's life and death are being marked in vigils and religious services.

"In response to Tom's passing, we ask that everyone set aside inclinations to vilify or demonize others, no matter what they have done," CPT said in a statement.

CPT is committed to non-violent action in conflict zones. The group has offices in Chicago and Toronto and was organized in 1984 by Mennonites, Brethren and Quakers – members of the traditional peace churches.

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