US officials have said they had no choice but to launch a special forces rescue operation in Yemen that ended with al-Qaeda killing an American photojournalist and a South African teacher.
The hostages - 33-year-old American Luke Somers and 57-year-old South African Pierre Korkie - were killed by their captors when US commandos stormed an al-Qaeda hideout early on Saturday.
The failed raid came after the kidnappers had threatened in a video to kill Somers within 72 hours, and just a day before Korkie was due to be released under a negotiated deal.
Calling the murders "barbaric", President Barack Obama said he had authorised the rescue attempt because the video and other information "indicated that Luke's life was in imminent danger".
"The United States will spare no effort to use all of its military, intelligence, and diplomatic capabilities to bring Americans home safely, wherever they are located," he said.
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"There were compelling reasons to believe Somers's life was in imminent danger," US Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel said in a statement after the operation.
"It was either act now and take the risk, or let that deadline pass. And no one was willing to do that," said a senior defence official who was with Hagel in the Afghan capital Kabul.
British-born Somers, 33, had worked as a freelance photographer for the BBC and spent time at local newspapers, including the Yemen Times, before being abducted in Sanaa in September 2013.
Korkie and his wife Yolande, who had worked as teachers in Yemen for four years, were kidnapped by al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula in May 2013.
She was released in January and the Gift of Givers charity said logistical arrangements had already been put in place to fly Korkie out of Yemen on Sunday.
