President Obama has ordered a review of U.S. policy on American hostages, but not paying ransoms to terrorist organizations is a policy that will not change.
In the wake of Peter Kassig’s beheading by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, Obama ordered the review of how U.S. policy affects efforts to free hostages — but paying ransom is not on the table, White House press secretary Josh Earnest said Tuesday.
“The reason for that is simple: We don’t want to put other American citizens at even greater risk when they’re around the globe, and that knowing that terrorist organizations can extract a ransom from the United States if they take a hostage only puts American citizens at greater risk,” he said.
Obama ordered the review “given sort of the extraordinary nature of some of the hostage takings that we’d seen this year,” Earnest said.
Some European nations pay ransoms for their hostages, and Treasury Department officials have pointed out that those ransoms are helping to fund the Islamic State’s jihadist efforts. In October, David Cohen, Treasury undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, said the extremist group had raised $20 million in ransom fees this year.
The departments of Defense and State, the FBI and intelligence officials will be part of the review.
