I wanted to punch the air with joy but I couldn’t. Those two men and the little girl were still in Kabul along with the Christian aid workers from the German charity Shelter Now International. I wanted to say so much but I was still shattered by the delay at the gates and the news that no British representatives were here.
There was a mêlée of people and I was led gently inside to a building and up some steps into a long room, which was crowded with military brass, diplomats and journalists. I was asked what I wanted to drink and I felt like saying a large Scotch, but I remembered I had left one Muslim country for another.
The camera lights went on again and I have to say that at this point I kicked into reporter mode and realised I had a great exclusive which Express Newspapers would want.
I turned and asked the deputy chief of protocol for Peshawar if he would tell the Pakistani TV crew to stop filming because I was exhausted and did not want to talk to anyone. The crew stopped filming without any objections and I thanked them. The Pakistani reporters sitting to my right also respected my wishes and stopped firing questions at me.
Tea and biscuits. It was all very civilised, all so British – except that I was the only Brit there. The Taliban diplomat sat opposite and he smiled over at me. I think he was just relieved I hadn’t badmouthed his people as I had constantly threatened to do throughout my captivity. Now he’d be able to go back to Kabul without fear of being shot or stoned.
The reality was that the Taliban had treated me with courtesy and respect, contrary to their reputation. The people with an almost relaxed capacity for barbarism had been chivalrous – which was more than I could say about the brutal and sometimes savage treatment that was soon to follow from so-called fellow journalists.
I was driven under an armed escort through the Khyber Pass and to the political agent’s office. As we made the journey his deputy, Shahzada Ziauddin Ali, said, ‘Don’t you remember me? I gave you access to the Khyber Pass a few weeks ago. If I had known you were going to do this I would have tried to get you into Afghanistan myself. I also said no cameras were to be taken.’ And at this he chuckled.
As we pulled into the office there were a few reporters and photographers standing at the entrance. They didn’t give our vehicle a second glance. Once inside, I was taken to an imposing teak-panelled office where Fida Muhammad Wazir was sitting waiting for ‘the troublesome Miss Ridley’. Behind him was a roll of honour listing the names of all the political agents to the Khyber Pass since the nineteenth century and there at the end was Mr Wazir’s. I pointed this out and he told me that he had taken up his appointment just a few weeks before I was captured.
He leaned forward and asked, ‘Who took you in and helped you around Afghanistan before you were caught?’ I smiled and said that, with all due respect, if I hadn’t told the Taliban for ten days then it was unlikely I would tell him. He nodded, showing neither approval nor disapproval.
I then asked him whether any of his people had been reported missing in Afghanistan since my arrest and he shook his head. I had to do something about my two guides and the little girl but I couldn’t confide in him, otherwise they would be in deeper trouble on their release.
I then added, ‘Shahzada tells me I have a lot to thank President Musharraf for because I understand he helped secure my release.’ He nodded and said he had put ‘immense’ pressure on the Taliban. I asked him to pass on my deepest and sincerest thanks.
Just then David Smith from the Daily Express knocked on the door and popped his head round. He looked aghast when he saw me. I suddenly felt self-conscious because I had no make-up on, my hair, still covered in a scarf, was a mess and the shalwar khameez outfit I was wearing was dusty and sweaty. Did I really look that bad?
However, the reason for David’s double take was that two minutes earlier he had been told by an official from the British Embassy that growing speculation over my release was premature. ‘“Don’t worry, we have our people at the border and the instant she comes through you will be the first to know”,’ recounted David, mimicking the embassy official’s voice.
He gave me a big hug and then ran out to find the agency photographers hired by the Express as he kicked into news-hound mode. Seconds later he was back, his mobile to his ear, while the photographer took his pictures. He then handed the phone over to me, and Chris Williams, editor of the Daily Express, exclaimed, ‘Welcome back! When we heard, a huge cheer went around the newsroom. Everyone is so delighted! How are you feeling?’
I felt emotions welling inside of me and told him how great it was to speak to him – and that I was dying to have one of Lynne’s Pimm’s at Stammy’s! I explained that I was going to give David a cracking story but also felt obliged to give a press conference to the media. I relayed my story to David and, being a reporter, I knew what bits to give him.
I sat and had another cup of tea with the political agent and he offered me some food from a very nice buffet. I enquired whether he was expecting more people and he said he was under the impression I would have been accompanied by officials from the British High Commission.
I have to say I was absolutely devastated and thought to myself: My God, something so bad has happened that they want nothing to do with me. Shahzada told me not to get upset and that he had arranged a big welcome-home party for me at his house. Later, I found out that the reason no one from the British High Commission met me at the border was because they had been expecting me much earlier and by the time I was set free it was pitch-black and impossible for the Royal Navy helicopters to fly.
I tried calling my mum but her phone was engaged. She was probably talking to Viv, because David Smith had told her I was back and would call later. Gary Trotter, a photographer with Images Sans Frontières, took loads of pictures and then David and I jumped into a waiting car. I sat in the back with another Images photographer, Aral Sedat, and we set off following Shahzada’s car, but as we reached his office we were ambushed by about fifty photographers, reporters and cameramen. ‘Keep your head down, and cover your face. Say nothing,’ shouted David to me. I was shocked and had a sudden flashback. Very similar words and phrases had been used as I had entered the land of the Taliban.
The car rocked a couple of times and suddenly one of the hacks opened the driver’s door and tried to take the keys out of the ignition to immobilise the vehicle. The driver was almost catatonic. Had he been prepared he would have driven through these callous bastards and they would have jumped out of the way, but he made the mistake of stopping.
Someone else tried to open my door and drag me out but Aral pulled me towards him and put a protective arm around me. At the second attempt to open the door David shouted, ‘C’mon lads. Give her a break. She’s just been in prison for ten days and we don’t know how she is. She’s not ready for this.’
Sympathy, that well-known word in the dictionary that comes somewhere between shit and syphilis, was not in evidence in Peshawar that night. ‘Get the bitch out, she knows the game,’ barked one photographer. ‘She’s a fucking journalist, she knows the score. Get her out now,’ screeched someone else. More abuse and anger followed.
Even when I was being driven around Jalalabad, accused of being an American spy, none of the Afghans or Taliban vented this sort of fury at me. They fired their guns in the air but I thought this lot’s mood was far uglier. I really could not believe what I was hearing. Not even my Taliban tormentors had spoken to me like that. They had shown me respect, but this lot had none for me at all. It was very confusing.
Shahzada jumped out of his car and managed to beat them off in spectacular fashion. When we got into his office I was dazed and confused. David asked if I was OK and I said I was really stunned. He then tried for a third time to raise ‘our man’ in Islamabad. He finally got hold of Colin Mulcahy, a diplomat at the high commission, who by this time was aware that Yvonne Ridley was back in town and in the hands of Express Newspapers. He said he was on his way to take me back to British High Commission.
&nb
sp; David then told me Paul Ashford, Editorial Director of Express Newspapers, and Salayha Hussain-Din, an Urdu-speaking lawyer who works in the company’s legal department, were also in Islamabad. I was stunned. ‘What? Ashford? Ashford’s out here? I don’t believe it. Oh, my God! The Taliban told me a high director had spoken with their embassy but I thought it must have been by telephone.’
David said the moment I was captured he was dispatched from Quetta to Islamabad to become a reporter/ diplomat/fixer until Paul Ashford arrived. The news then got even better.
Salayha Hussain-Din had accompanied him to smooth through any cultural differences. She and I had very quickly become friends after the Richard Desmond takeover in November 2000. The legal department had moved into offices near my desk and Paul Ashford set up an office just opposite. The three of us used to do coffee and tea runs for each other.
I asked David about my family, because I was under the impression that my mother was somewhere in Islamabad. All the Pakistan officials had been talking very excitedly about her as though they had spoken with her personally. Little did I know she had become a great British institution overnight. I was to find out a lot more about her stunning media performances over the garden gate in the coming days.
David then introduced me to a very quiet, young man who was sitting in the corner. His name was Akbar Shinwari and he had worked round the clock with David, organising cars and security for my impending release. Akbar had even gone out and bought a burka, which was used by one of the photographers to lure the baying press away when we left the political agent’s office. It was a good diversionary tactic but it fooled only some people into believing that the burka-clad person in the back of a car was me.
Colin Mulcahy arrived in a Range Rover and we headed off to Islamabad. Although I was very hacked off, he was an extremely endearing person and very disarming, which is why, I suppose, he works as a diplomat. As we headed towards the capital he said, ‘I hear you were very difficult inside. Have you been in a foreign prison before? There are courses you can go on that guide you how to behave when you’re arrested.’
I stated that I hadn’t been to prison before and was wondering why he had inquired. This was the second time in two weeks I’d been asked that. I continued, ‘If I’d been locked up in either Iraq or Iran I would have been on my knees begging for mercy, but these people were different. I tried to push the Taliban as far as I could because I needed them to think that I was the complete opposite of what they expect from their women. It seemed to work well and here I am. Hopefully, I’ll be allowed to remain in Islamabad and continue my work.’
He told me there was no way I could stay: I had become a security risk because I was instantly recognisable. It was only then that it began to dawn on me just how massive the media treatment of my arrest and detention had been.
Just then his mobile sounded, and he handed it to me. Paul Ashford was on the line so I braced myself for a bollocking. He sounded exhausted, emotional, tired and happy. I apologised for being such a nuisance and then asked about circulation. ‘Yvonne, this is not a time to be thinking about circulation. We want to know how you are. You don’t know what you’ve put us through but we’re so happy you’re safe.’
I couldn’t believe the warmth that came tumbling through that mobile phone. People get the impression that Ashford’s a bit of a cold fish. Clearly he is not. He’s very tall and lanky and has a beard, and when he wanders around the office he seems quite detached. He’s also one of Richard Desmond’s (the chairman’s) right-hand men and so there are those who are naturally wary of him.
The clock was nudging 11 p.m., so we agreed to meet in the morning at the High Commission. As we arrived a film crew shot us driving into the compound where the Ambassador, Hilary Synnott, and his wife Annie were waiting to greet me. He asked me what I would like and I said, ‘A large Scotch and a bacon sandwich,’ then added, ‘It’s OK. I’m only joking about the sandwich. I’ll wait until I get home.’ˇ
However, Annie turned out to be the perfect hostess and amazingly whipped up a delicious bacon sarnie. In the meantime, I finally got through to my mother’s home and a strange bloke answered. I enquired who he was and it turned out to be Mark Blacklock, an Express journalist based in Newcastle. He had the job of ‘babysitting’ my mother to make sure she didn’t fall into the hands of a rival publication. This was so bizarre.
Finally, I spoke to my mother, and she sounded so very elated and happy. I said I would speak to her in the morning. She said she had spoken to Daisy and Daisy had squealed with excitement down the line, and had then dropped the phone and had run off to tell all her friends.
Hilary was a superb host and he began filling me in on what I had missed. He then remarked that he had heard I had been ‘extremely difficult’ inside the prison and he’d been told this by the Taliban Ambassador, Zaeef.
Apparently Zaeef had told him that a representative of the British High Commission had to be at the border to collect me because ‘she is saying very nasty things about us and you must stop her’. I laughed at the very thought that the world’s most feared regime was getting upset because I had threatened to expose them. He, too, found it amusing and then added, ‘I told them we can’t gag members of the British press – I’m afraid I’ve got no control there.’ Hmm, I think Hilary could have left the last remarks until I was safely out.
I took my holdall upstairs. David Smith had packed it when he had emptied my room in the Crown Plaza. Why are men incapable of packing bags? Anyway, I routed through it and there were a couple of things missing. Most notable was my Agent Provocateur perfume in a grenade-shaped pink bottle. I did not know who had taken it, but I wondered what they made of that. I had been accused of being a spy and someone must have gone into my room and seen this bottle.
I then dived into the shower and it was glorious. It was a real shower, no zinc bucket or cold water. Oh, joy! Everything was so clean and tidy and there were loads of smellies. I couldn’t find my nightie, either, so I put on my Osama bin Laden T-shirt and slipped between wonderfully clean cotton sheets. I was in heaven.
The next morning I was up at around seven and went for a walk in the grounds of the British High Commission, which are beautiful. There was a lovely water feature on one of the lawns and a more private garden by the side of the house, which itself wasn’t particularly inspiring from an architectural point of view.
The Synnotts have two dogs, and, as you already know, I hate dogs. One of them was trying to terrorise a cat, which had positioned itself out of harm’s way halfway up a trellis. I gave the hound a wide berth but the damned thing decided I was more interesting and chased me back up the garden steps.
I was greeted by Annie, and she invited me to sit at the breakfast table overlooking the garden. It was a most civilised way to start the day. We were soon joined by David Smith, who wanted to work on his second part of my prison experience.
I had mentioned before that I had kept a secret diary. He wanted it, but I explained it was written for the Sunday Express. I asked him about the bottle of perfume and he said that he hadn’t noticed it. But he then added, ‘It was really weird going into your room and not knowing what was happening to you. The room looked dishevelled and the bed looked as though it had been slept in. The television was still on, so were the lights and there was a “do not disturb” sign on the door.
‘I found your bag and passport but I couldn’t find your Cartier watch in the room safe, which I was told to look for. The room safe was wide open. Then I discovered you’d actually put your watch in the hotel safe downstairs.’
I was really surprised by what he said. ‘But David,’ I said, ‘everything was switched off when I left the room. This is really weird. It’s awful to think someone’s been through my things. I wonder if the Taliban sent someone round, because I gave the interrogators my room number and told them where my passport was.’
It was most disconcerting, but I did find out later that an Italian television crew had br
ibed their way into Room 109 to film the inside. The Express photographers had also been there, but the pictures I was shown bore no resemblance to how I had left the room. My contacts book was lying open, my bed looked unmade, the perfume was missing from the dressing table and I certainly did not leave a ‘do not disturb’ sign outside the door.
I didn’t dwell on it too much at the time because there were other far more taxing things on my mind. But a chance remark and a sinister turn of events would bring me back to Room 109.
11
HOME
Later that morning I had a visit from representatives of the American, Australian and German embassies, who were greatly concerned about the eight aid workers from the German-based Shelter Now International charity. They wanted to know how their people were and what sort of condition they were in.
I was glad to be able to tell them that the German team of Georg Taubmann, Kathe Jelinek, Margrit Stebner and Silke Durrkopf were fine, as were the Australians Peter Bunch and Diana Thomas. In my opinion, their spirits were good and their amazing faith and belief in God was getting them through. The diplomats left, grateful for the news.
I then turned to the American Ambassador and said that Dayna Curry was also fine and well, but that I feared for the youngest of the group, Heather Mercer, because I thought she was vulnerable to her situation. I had been with the women for only a relatively short time and Heather appeared to be very bright, loving and giving. However, I added, her reaction to the day the U.S. spy planes were shot at concerned me and her fellow Christians.
‘You’ve simply got to get them out of there because they’re not going to get a fair trial and I don’t think Heather can take much more,’ I said.
In the Hands of the Taliban Page 18