A Captivating Learning Experience

It is a matter for celebration when those who have been abducted in foreign countries have somehow been rescued from the scene of their unwilling captivity. On the other hand, you've really got to shake your head, at least metaphorically, at the insistent incaution of those who believe they're somehow immune from harm when they venture into dangerous situations.

In the case of Canadian Amanda Lindhout, a self-proclaimed independent journalist, with, actually, no journalistic background, who nonetheless thrust herself into a geography fraught with danger, and not without prior knowledge of previous abductions of foreigners by terror groups or just plain criminal gangs, the ignorance is appalling.

This woman obviously felt she had a calling, to report on situations prevailing in dangerous parts of the world. She ventured into Somalia, a country wracked by civil war, where danger lurks everywhere, thanks to the utter ineptness of its hapless government in securing even a vestige of law and order for its citizens.

Where, in fact, an Islamist insurgency is ongoing, and where the Somalians are caught in an ongoing cycle of brutality, oppression and privation. In the company of an adventurous Australian photographer and a Somalian journalist-driver, she left the capital, Mogadishu to interview refugees in an area distinctly outside the zone of government security, such as it is.

Where they were all speedily taken captive. Ms. Lindhout cannot have been ignorant of that potential. Government of Canada representatives attempted to dissuade her from entering the country, emphasizing the danger inherent in travelling there. She was adamant; it was her intention to travel there, and to report from that country.

Which is why, on August 23, 2008 she, the photo-journalist and a Somali journalist drove 20 kilometres outside Mogadishu in a mission to retrieve stories about internally displaced unfortunates, hoping to sell them as human-interest fodder to news agencies in the west. Once outside the city's perimeter they were sitting ducks. Ambushed and taken from their vehicle, they became prisoners of high value.

"It was extremely oppressive. I was kept by myself at all times. I had no one to speak to. I was normally kept in a room with a light, no window. I had nothing to write on or with. There was very little food. I was allowed to use the toilet exactly five times a day", she lamented after her release. And, she was also beaten, she testified, repeatedly.

The governments of Canada and Australia intervened as much as possible, on behalf their nationals, interacting with the government in Mogadishu, but getting nowhere in their attempts. They were captured not by rebels, nor fanatical religious ideologues, but extortionists, and perhaps in collusion with some government officials.

The only purpose in their being apprehended, was to be able to trade them off for cash. Big cash ransoms, in the millions, on the received wisdom that western countries would pay, and handsomely, and anyone who lived in such well-endowed countries had more than ample millions to spare. And, in any event, in lawless countries anything goes.

In a sense, then, Ms. Lindhout and her photojournalist companion Nigel Brennen, shared the experiences of the desperate, ill, malnourished refugees they sought to get stories out of to pay their bills and ramp up professional reputations. Western governments balk at paying ransom, recognizing it as giving a green light to further abductions of their nationals.

In the end, it was Ms. Lindhout's family, and likely that of Mr. Brennan's, who anted up the ransom, mortgaging their home, lending money where they could, asking for the support of extended family and sympathizers, to come up with the ransom required to set them free, coming somewhat short of the one million finally agreed upon, but seemingly acceptable to their captors.

Furiously resentful that their government disappointed their expectations.