Freed Irish journalist Rory Carroll said today he feared he would suffer the same fate as other Western hostages when he was kidnapped in Baghdad.
The
Guardian
newspaper's Iraq correspondent was kidnapped in the Shia Muslim slums of Baghadad's Sadr City last Wednesday and freed on Thursday night after 36 hours in captivity.
Speaking at a press conference after returning home to Dublin today, Mr Carroll (33) said he felt "very, very fortunate".
"To be kidnapped in Baghdad as a Westerner is not good news. We know the outcome of other hostages taken before.
"So not only to be released alive, but to be released so swiftly is extraordinary. I feel very, very fortunate".
He expressed his gratitude to the Irish, British, and Iraqi governments all of whom "did wonders".
"They responded extremely swiftly," he added. He also thanked officials from Iran, Italy and France as his colleagues in the Guardianfor their help in securing his release.
Mr Carroll described how he continuously reinforced the fact to his kidnappers that he was Irish and not British. It is believed he may have been taken by Shia militia trying to secure the release of members being held by the British army in Basra.
"I didn't stop stressing it," he added. He said he used what little Arabic he knew as he was being sped away in the kidnappers car to say: "I am an Irish journalist".
"When eventually I was passed over to my main captors...again I reinforced the point that I was Irish, that I wasn't English." He said he used references to the IRA, U2, and even drew a map of Western Europe to pinpoint the location of his home country.
However, he said the significance "didn't seem to register" with the men holding him. "At the end I was down to Enya, Fair City, so at that point I gave up," Mr Carroll quipped.
He said he remained calm throughout his ordeal despite the circumstance and that the gang leader
kept him relaxed. "I think psychologically he was quite shrewd the way he handled me. He tried to keep me docile and that worked."
He said there were some moments of humour during his captivity. "It was pretty horrible at times, but I couldn't help but see the funny side, the fact that these children would occasionally run around an peek in and try to poke me."
But he told reporters of his underlying fear of being "sold" to another, more rootless, criminal gang who may harm him.
"Lying there in the dark...I was bracing myself that at some point I would hear a car coming into the house, I knew I would be able to hear it across the gravel, and that there would be a bunch a guys with guns and that I would be put into their custody and be taken, with a hood over my head, to an uncertain destination and to an uncertain fate.
"I assumed that was going to happen at some point."
