LONDON (AP) — A retired British couple snatched from their yacht by Somali pirates said in an interview broadcast Friday they fear they could be killed within a week or handed to a terrorist group if a ransom demand is not paid.

Paul and Rachel Chandler were kidnapped last month by pirates who seized their 38-foot yacht — the Lynn Rival — as they sailed toward Tanzania.

In an interview with a British news program, the Chandlers are seen surrounded by armed men, some of whom have their guns pointed directly at the couple.

“I have no doubt that they will not hesitate to kill us in a week or so from now,” Paul Chandler, 59, said in the interview, filmed by a Channel 4 crew on Wednesday.

Pirates have demanded $7 million to release the Chandlers, but Britain’s government insists it won’t pay ransom to kidnappers.

“We are under threat and we are told that we will not be fed and given water, so we are very concerned about the future,” Rachel Chandler, 55, said in the video. “We ask the government, and the people of Britain and our family, to do whatever they can to enter into negotiations with these people to buy back our lives.”

She said the couple had been told by their captors that a terrorist cell is searching for them.

An Islamic militia commander and a local elder in the central Somali village of Bahdo told the Associated Press previously that rival pirates and militia groups had fought for control of the British couple.