White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest told reporters on Monday that the U.S. does not pay terrori

The U.S. government expressed relief over the release of a freelance reporter who had been held hostage for nearly two years by an al-Qaida-linked group in Syria.
Peter Theo Curtis, who wrote under the byline Theo Padnos, was freed Sunday, offering consolation to U.S. officials, a journalism community and family members deeply unnerved by the grisly video of the beheading of another journalist, James Foley, in a desolate desert landscape.
Curtis' release appeared to have been aided by the oil-rich nation of Qatar, which said Sunday that it had "exerted relentless efforts" to win the American's freedom. Qatar is a leading supporter of the Syrian rebels fighting to oust President Bashar Assad and has been involved in mediating past hostage releases.
Briefing reporters in Washington on Monday, White House press secretary Josh Earnest said the United States helped facilitate conversations between Qatar and the Curtis family. But Earnest reiterated the United States' longstanding policy that it does not provide ransom to terrorist organizations holding American hostages and did not ask the Qataris to do so.
"That policy is in place because providing ransoms to terrorist organizations only gives those terrorist organizations access to more funds and resources. It also makes American citizens more likely targets of terrorist organizations, knowing that they could eventually hold them for ransom. So this is a policy that we have pursued and that — not only do we not pay ransoms, we tell other organizations and countries not to pay ransoms for American citizens for precisely those reasons," Earnest said.

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