HSBC employees sacked for ISIL-style mock beheading

Caroline Mortimer | The Independent

Show Caption Hide Caption Bankers fired for mock Islamic State-style beheading video HSBC has fired six employees who staged a mock Islamic State group-style execution during a team-building exercise.

HSBC has sacked six employees after a video emerged of them engaging in an Islamic State group-style "mock beheading".

British newspaper The Sun revealed that a video posted on Instagram but later deleted, showed five men wearing balaclavas force an Asian colleague to kneel down while wearing an orange jumpsuit.

One banker then reportedly yells "Allahu Akbar", meaning "God is great", and pretends to execute his prisoner with a coat hanger.

The workers filmed the stunt while be on a team-building day organised by HSBC in Birmingham, England, according to The Sun.

On Monday the bank apologized for its employees.

In a statement an HSBC spokesman said: "We do not tolerate inappropriate behavior.

"As soon as The Sun brought this video to our attention we took the decision to sack the individuals involved.

"This is an abhorrent video and HSBC would like to apologise for any offence."

The world has been shocked by the brutal murders carried out by the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, over the past year, with brutal propaganda videos showing the execution of Western journalists and aid workers.

Alan Henning, 47, a taxi driver from Salford, northwestern England, who was in Syria to do humanitarian work, was killed by the British militant identified as Mohammed Emwazi last year, days after Western powers began air strikes against the group which controls territory in Iraq and Syria.

U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Antony Blinken said last month that more than 10,000 militants had been killed in the air strikes and insisted the campaign had made an impact.

This is an edited version of a story that originally appeared in The Independent. The content was created separately from USA TODAY.

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