The burning of Jordanian pilot Muath al-Kaseasbeh alive in a cage by his Isis captors was perhaps the most chilling visuals from the violence unleashed by the Sunni extremist outfit Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. Now a former militant has revealed how the militant group carried out the execution of the pilot.
In a documentary carried by the Al Arabiya television, the former terrorist recounted the last moments of the pilot, who was captured after his fighter jet crashed in the Syrian stronghold of the Daesh. The militant said the pilot, whose killing accelerated the air attacks by the Arab coalition on Isis targets, did not know he was going to e executed.
"We filmed him on the site of where he was going to be executed and zoomed in on his face, but at that time he didn't know we were planning to set him a light," the militant said.
The unnamed militant said the Isis core group decided to send a message to the whole world by burning al-Kaseasbeh alive. The pilot knew he was to be executed only when his captors poured gasoline over him inside the cage. Before he was led to the cage the pilot was paraded through the streets turned into rubble by the coalition bombing.
Isis released a video showing a man on fire inside a cage. Jordan later confirmed the death of the pilot. Immediately after the execution there were reports that Isis had drugged the pilot heavily.
The report citing an unidentified ISIS militant noted that the Jordanian pilot was administered enough sedative to "make sure to kill a sense of what is happening around him."
"It is important to note that [Kaseasbeh] seemed unconscious and unaware of what awaits him and not, as some have said, that he is not afraid," a report carried by Saudi Arabia's Burnews.com had said.
The Royal Jordanian Air Force pilot's Lockheed Martin F-16 fighter crashed near Islamic State stronghold of Raqqa on 24 December 2014 after a mechanical snag. Isis released a video showing the pilot's execution on 3 February 2015, after Jordanian government insisted on getting proof that he was alive for any negotiation to go ahead.
