Ayako Inoue, sister of Nahoko Takato, one of the three Japanese hostages, cries as she speaks to supporters during an anti-war rally near the official residence of Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi in Tokyo on Sunday. (AFP)

Tokyo, April 11 (Reuters): Relatives of three Japanese hostages captured in Iraq made anguished pleas for the release of their loved ones today and begged the government to bring Japan’s troops home to help save them.

“What we want most of all is for the troops to be withdrawn to save their lives,” Ayako Inoue, sister of aid worker Nahoko Takato, said. “I don’t have time to cry,” she said, barely able to speak through her tears. “I haven’t given up.”

A Japanese diplomat in Amman said earlier that neither the whereabouts nor the safety of the three had been confirmed, prolonging the agony of their families who had earlier greeted reports of their imminent release with tears of joy.

“He really loved all the children, and the adults too of Iraq,” said Kimiko Koriyama, mother of freelance reporter Soichiro, 32. “Please let him see the smiling faces of those young boys and girls again. I beg you.”

Arabic television channel Al Jazeera reported earlier that the militants holding the hostages would free them in response to a call from the Muslim Clerics Association in Iraq.

However, today the channel broadcast an interview with a man claiming to have visited leaders of guerrillas holding the three Japanese prisoners, who said they told him they would kill the hostages within 24 hours.

A man described as Muzhir al-Duleimi, head of the League for the Defence of the Rights of the Iraqi People, told a correspondent for Al Jazeera in Baghdad that previous reports that the hostage-takers were about to free the Japanese had been untrue. It was not clear when the 24-hour deadline would expire.

On Thursday, the militants had threatened to burn the hostages alive unless Japanese troops were pulled out of Iraq within three days — Sunday evening Tokyo Time.

Despite the threats, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi has vowed not to withdraw Japan’s nearly 550 non-combat troops from their reconstruction and humanitarian mission in southern Iraq.

“If only our own children come home, we still won’t be happy,” said Naoko Imai, mother of 18-year-old hostage Noriaki.

“We want all of the people being held to come back,” she said at an office the families have made their headquarters in Tokyo. Earlier, the families handed a petition to the government that they said had been signed by 150,000 people urging the lives of the hostages be saved.