CNN - Women held in Iraq: Dr. Germ, Mrs. Anthrax

Islamic militants who beheaded an American contractor in Iraq say they will kill the other two hostages -- an American and a Briton -- unless Iraqi women are released from two American prisons in the country.

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They are Dr. Rihab Rashid Taha Al-Azzawi Al-Tikriti, a scientist who became known as "Dr. Germ" for helping Iraq make weapons out of anthrax, and Huda Salih Mahdi Ammash, a biological weapons researcher known as "Mrs. Anthrax."

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A mobile weapons laboratory found in northern Iraq did contain equipment for making biological agents but no biological material was found, U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld is expected to tell the Pentagon Tuesday. Pentagon officials told CNN the equipment in the truck had "recently been thoroughly scrubbed."

UPDATE: CNN - Iraq: 'Dr. Germ' to be freed on bail

The Iraqi Council of Ministers plans to release a female prisoner "on bail" from U.S. custody but did not say whether it was responding to recent terrorist demands that women prisoners be freed, according to a Ministry of Justice spokesman.

However, the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad said Wednesday that neither of two Iraqi female prisoners being held by U.S. authorities would be released imminently, Reuters reported.