Posted on 04/08/2003 7:59:28 AM PDT by kattracks
Polish Reporters Held in Iraq Escape
By MONIKA SCISLOWSKA .c The Associated Press
WARSAW, Poland (AP) - Two Polish journalists who were abducted by armed Iraqis said Tuesday they escaped unscathed in a dramatic getaway as artillery shells boomed near the school where they were being held.
Marcin Firlej, a reporter for the private TVN24 news channel, said he and Polish state radio reporter Jacek Kaczmarek escaped when a teacher returned their car keys and gestured for them to go.
Iraqis had stopped the two Monday afternoon at a checkpoint near Hillah, south of Baghdad, as they were traveling from the town of Nasiriyah with other journalists. Word of the abduction came from other Polish reporters in the convoy who escaped but managed to film the incident.
``We are fine, Jacek and I,'' Firlej told TVN24 by satellite phone Tuesday from the city of Najaf. ``The Iraqis treated us quite well.''
Firlej said the Iraqis tied both men's hands and took them to an army post in a village nearby before bringing them to Hillah, where they were blindfolded and questioned by Iraqi secret service officers at a school building - complete with children's drawings on the walls.
``They said they would treat us as spies not POWs, and we kept saying we were not spies but journalists,'' Firlej said.
Later, their blindfolds were removed and their hands untied, and the journalists were put in another room.
Shells fell for about 30 minutes overnight and resumed in the morning - much stronger and closer, Firlej said.
``The whole building was shaking from shells falling,'' about 150 yards away, he said.
Firlej and Kaczmarek escaped when a school teacher ``gave us our car keys and gestured to show it was not safe under the shelling.'' The pair drove off and later found U.S. troops, who said they would be safe in Najaf, Firlej said.
Kaczmarek also called Polish state radio to confirm that he was free and unharmed.
In footage of their capture broadcast Tuesday by TVN24, Firlej and Kaczmarek could be seen getting out of their jeep and walking to the side of the road with their hands up as two armed men pointed guns at them and motioned at them to put down any objects they had.
Two more armed men arrived on the scene and appeared to start shooting at the other cars in their convoy, which drove off.
Firlej said the Iraqis were ``firing in the air, so we knew no bullets hit our friends.''
Both men carried accreditation issued by the U.S. military. TVN24 said Monday that Firlej and his crew were originally assigned to a U.S. unit, but left it Friday and started traveling independently together with another crew from parent company TVN.
04/08/03 10:54 EDT
"Later, their blindfolds were removed and their hands untied, and the journalists were put in another room."
The Iraqis did not really think they were spies. If they had, the journalists would either be dead or missing important body parts.
In a word? Yes.
"Later, their blindfolds were removed and their hands untied, and the journalists were put in another room."
In another room, presumably somewhere near their car, I guess.
Just BTTT.
Okay...I see. This was Rick Leventhaul's unit. I think he said a convoy of reporters ran off on their own. Then later came racing back.
They said men in black outfits captured 2 reporters and wanted the Marines to rescue them.
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