His family said they had been told the price of his release would be several million Syrian pounds (tens of thousands of UK pounds or US dollars).
BBC: Syria: Islamist Nusra Front gives BBC exclusive interview
The inability of HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) to properly curb aggressive tax avoidance schemes is costing the UK billions of pounds, a report suggests.
BBC: Tax avoidance schemes 'costs UK billions in lost revenue'
The US adopted decimal dollars hundreds of years ago and the UK clung to pounds-shillings-pence-farthings until 1976(?) Hardly anyone but older Britons can even imagine how to divide a bill for 7 Pounds, 5 Shillings and five Pence among three diners, or the painful calculations involved.
The new San Francisco 2 with rather formidable specs is debuting in the UK prepaid under 100 pounds.
The UK government has lost billions of pounds to this fraud since the start of the decade as a result of paying out on dishonest claims for VAT repayment.
The jury heard millions of pounds were transferred from the UK to bank accounts in Spain.
The UK Drug Policy Commission said billions of pounds a year were spent tackling drug problems, "without always knowing what difference it makes".
Firms providing pensions across the UK may need to find millions of pounds to plug funding gaps if Scotland opts for independence, a report has suggested.
Multinationals such as Starbucks, Google and Amazon have come under fire for paying little or no corporation tax despite generating UK sales of hundreds of millions of pounds.
The High Court heard that tens of millions of pounds was held in the UK and frozen by the government during the crisis that engulfed KSFIOM's Icelandic parent bank, Kaupthing.
The court has previously heard that tens of millions of pounds was held in the UK and frozen by the UK government during the crisis that engulfed its Icelandic parent bank, Kaupthing.
In addition to the recent cuts in interest rates, the Bank of England and the government have given the UK's banking sector billions of pounds in loans to try to restore lending levels to normal.
However, Starbucks felt his remark about "smell the coffee" was a "cheap shot" at the company and considered suspending millions of pounds worth of investment in the UK, the Sunday Telegraph reported.
Meanwhile, the new oil and gas strategy aimed at securing thousands of jobs and billions of pounds of investment was unveiled by UK Business Secretary Vince Cable in Aberdeen, which is known as the oil capital of Europe.
It is estimated that more than a billion pounds is lost every year to the UK economy due to people taking time off work with severe headache or migraine.
Back in March, a report by MPs said that the UK could lose out on hundreds of billions of pounds in green investment and fail to meet climate change targets if the government compromised on its plans for the green bank.
BBC: Clegg: UK green bank 'to begin investing in April 2012'
Moving nuclear weapons from the Clyde after Scottish independence would cost billions of pounds and thousands of jobs, according to the UK government.
"The foot-and-mouth-disease virus epidemic in the UK in 2001 was disastrous and cost the economy billions of pounds in control measures and compensation, " explained Dr Bryan Charleston, Head of Livestock Viral Diseases Programme at the Pirbright Institute.
Responding to criticism from the industry that the increase had prompted it to review billions of pounds of investment in oil and gas fields under UK waters, the Treasury told MPs that evidence from a similar tax increase in 2005 showed it had "little effect", and that investment was more closely aligned to the oil price.
The UK government has said the Welfare Reform Bill would save billions of pounds by replacing Disability Living Allowance with a personal independence payment and replacing a range of other benefits with a single universal credit.
Despite making sales of hundreds of millions of pounds, they reported small profits or even losses in the UK after shifting their earnings to overseas operations.
BBC: Apple 'among largest tax avoiders in US' - Senate committee
Their pensions are frozen at the date when they first claimed them leaving some older people with just a few pounds a week despite a lifetime working and contributing to the UK National Insurance scheme.
"Customers should be assured that UK retailers always take the protection of cardholder data seriously and are continuing to invest millions of pounds to enhance existing security measures, " said Jane Milne of the British Retail Consortium.
The Cambridge, UK-based company reported pre-tax second quarter earnings before items of 54.2 million pounds, or 2.98 pence per share, up 27% over the year-ago quarter.
Millions of pounds will be invested in army bases in the East Midlands as troops are welcomed back to the UK as part of defence reforms.
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