US journalist Jill Carroll released after almost three months of captivity
Baghdad (AsiaNews/Agencies) US journalist Jill Carroll, who was abducted in Iraq almost three months ago, has been set free. The announcement was made by Iraqi police and Tariq al-Hashimi, the head of the Iraqi Islamic Party.
The freelance journalist, who worked for Boston-based Christian Science Monitor, was abducted January 7 in West Baghdad's neighbourhood of Adil on her way to interview Adnan al-Dulaimi, a Sunni political leader. Her interpreter, 32-year-old Allan Enwiyah, was killed during the kidnapping near Dulaimi's office.
"I am happy to learn that she was freed," Hashimi said, "because I never stopped to worry about her fate since the day she was abducted". Mr Hashimi had several times urged her kidnappers to let her go.
Police Lt. Col. Falah al-Mohammedawi said Carroll was released near an office of the Iraqi Islamic Party in western Baghdad by an unidentified group and then handed over to US forces.
Her captors, calling themselves the Revenge Brigades, had demanded the release of all women detainees in Iraq by February 26 and said Carroll would be killed if that didn't happen.
Katie Carroll, the journalist's twin sister, made an appeal yesterday on Arabic-language satellite TV al-Arabiya, stressing how the abduction had been an ordeal for her and her family and appealing to the Iraqi people for information useful for her liberation.
"It has been nearly two months since the last video of my sister was broadcast. We have had no contact with her nor received any information about her condition," Katie Carroll said, adding that "I've been living a nightmare, worrying if she is hurt or ill. There is no one I hold closer to my heart than my sister and I am deeply worried wondering how she is being treated."
Ms Carroll also thanked the Iraqi people for the support and friendship shown during the ordeal.
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