U.S. female journalist Jill Carroll, who was kidnapped in Baghdad on Jan. 7, has asked people to meet her kidnappers' demand as soon as possible in order to secure her release, according to a latest videotape aired by a private Kuwaiti satellite channel on late Thursday.

    KUWAIT CITY, Feb. 10 (Xinhuanet) -- The captors of U.S. female journalist Jill Carroll have threatened to kill her after their demands will not be met before Feb. 26, Kuwait's al-Rai television reported on Friday.

    The private TV channel quoted sources close to the kidnappers as saying that the Iraqi captors have set the final deadline for their demands, or they will implement the death punishment stipulated by religious law.

    According to the sources, Carroll is in a safe house in downtown Baghdad with a group of women.

    The kidnappers have demanded the U.S. forces and the Iraqi interim government to release all Iraqi women prisoners.

    Earlier on late Thursday, Kuwait's al-Rai TV also reported with a latest videotape that Carroll, who was kidnapped in Baghdad on Jan. 7, has asked people to meet her kidnappers' demand as soon as possible in order to secure her release.

    "I am here. I am fine. Please just do whatever they want, give them whatever they want as quickly as possible. There is a very short time. Please do it fast. That's all," said Carroll, who was wearing a headscarf and sitting before a wall decorated by a tapestry in the tape.

    Carroll, 28, a freelance journalist working for the Boston-based Christian Science Monitor, was abducted on Jan. 7 by a group of gunmen in the al-Adel district in western Baghdad after she left the office of a prominent Sunni Arab leader.

    The Thursday tape is the latest one showing Carroll after the pan-Arab al-Jazeera TV aired two videotapes on Jan. 31 and Jan. 17respectively.

    The video aired on Jan. 31, which was dated to Jan. 28, showed the female U.S. journalist in a white headscarf and weeping, but no sound could be heard.

    But the al-Jazeera broadcaster said that Carroll called on her family, her colleagues and Americans to ask the U.S. army and the Iraqi Interior Ministry to free all the Iraqi women prisoners.

    In the Jan. 17 video, the kidnappers set an ultimatum of 72 hours to the U.S. forces and the Iraqi authorities to meet their demand or they would kill Carroll.

    Last month, the U.S. military set free 419 Iraqi prisoners including five women, a move expected to be helpful to secure Carroll's release. About four other Iraqi women have remained in U.S. and Iraqi detention.

    Some 200 foreigners have been kidnapped in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion of the country in March 2003. Dozens of the hostages were killed.  Enditem