Japanese Red Army gunmen held out in the American International Assurance building in the Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur, on Monday night (4 August) with about fifty hostages, awaiting the arrival of seven comrades the Japanese Government promises to free.

The heavily armed, masked men -- estimated to number between four and eight -- shot their way into the twelve-storey property soon after breakfast (local time) on Monday morning. A cordon of 200 heavily armed police was thrown around the building. Two policemen and a watchman were wounded by gunfire.

The gunmen threatened to kill their hostages unless Japan released seven comrades, and arrangements were made for their own safe conduct to an undisclosed destination.

The Japanese Government ordered the release of the seven imprisoned Red Army members and made ready an airliner to fly them to Kuala Lumpur.According to Reuter reports,it may arrive according to the Japanese Foreign Ministry, two of the seven have refused to make the journey.

Their refusal seemed likely to mean further delicate negotiations with the gunmen... and inevitable tension for the fifty or more hostages, who include the United States Consul, Mr. Robert Stebbins and the Swedish Charge d'Affaires, Mr. Fredrik Bergenstrahle.

The U.S. Consulate and Swedish Embassy occupy the ninth floor of the building. According to Malaysian Government officials, the hostages were still unhurt late on Monday night.

Japanese security police describe the Red Army as an extremist organisation which has links with several terrorist groups. Two of those the gunmen want freed, were jailed in Japan after a ten-day siege of a mountain villa where they held a woman hostage ??? February 1972. Along with three others, they were charged with killing two policemen and a civilian and executing fourteen members of their own organisation.