DUBAI, Sept 23 (AFP) - A group calling itself the "Jihad Organization" said Thursday it had "slaughtered" two Italian hostages in Iraq, in a statement posted on an Islamist website.
But Italy said it had no information which could confirm the execution of the two women aid workers, sources close to Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi cited by the Italian news agency ANSA said.
They said the claim of the executions, which would be the third and fourth hostages murdered in Iraq within 48 hours following the beheading of two US captives, should be treated with the utmost caution.
The claim by the "Jihad Organization" that the two 29-year-old women, Simona Pari and Simona Torretta had been "slaughtered" could not be immediately verified.
Both of them were abducted in Baghdad on September 7, along with two Iraqi colleagues. An Islamist group calling itself the Islamic Jihad Organization in Iraq subsequently demanded that staunch US ally Italy withdraw its 3,000 troops stationed in Iraq, or the two Italians would be killed.
Early Thursday, a statement on an Islamist website said that "We in the Jihad Organization in Iraq announce that the ruling of God Almighty has been implemented on the two Italian prisoners by slaughter."
Referring to Pari and Torretta without naming them, it said they were executed "after the Italian government, led by the despicable Berlusconi, did not heed our sole condition (for releasing them), which was to pull out of Iraq."
The "Jihad Organization" vowed to "deliver blows to the Italian government, and to continue striking it and striking every foreigner residing in Iraq."
"We will turn Iraq into a graveyard for you and for anyone who ventures to attack Muslims," the statement added.
The statement was posted on a website seldom used to make such claims and was dated Wednesday.
ANSA said that Italian intelligence services believed the Internet site which posted the execution claim was not very reliable.
The humanitarian organization Intersos, which one of the two abducted Iraqis was working for, also said the claim was unreliable.
"Our sources in Baghdad do not consider... this announcement reliable," Nino Sergi, the secretary general of the Rome-based organization, said.
On Wednesday, Italian press reports said that the Italian secret service had made indirect contact with the women's kidnappers and believed they were alive.
The reported execution comes after the beheading of two US hostages in Iraq, Jack Hensley and Eugene Armstrong, held by the Al-Qaeda linked group Tawhid wal Jihad (UNity and Holy War) and led by suspected Al-Qaeda number two Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi.
That same group is also holding a British hostage, Kenneth Bigley, who on Wednesday issued an emotional plea for mercy via a video posted on an Islamist website.
There have been no pictures or videos posted of the two women since their kidnapping, in contrast to the videotaped execution of the two US hostages, and the purported plea for his life from the British hostage.