CBC NEWS EXCLUSIVE
Transcript: Robert Fowler interview
Canadian diplomat speaks with Peter Mansbridge about his abduction ordeal
Last Updated: Tuesday, September 8, 2009 | 10:57 PM ET Comments0Recommend6CBC News
Robert Fowler talks about how he was captured, what happened to him in captivity and how he was eventualy released in a CBC News exclusive. (Tom Sharina/CBC News) This is the untold story of Canadian diplomat Robert Fowler, who, for 130 days earlier this year, was held at gunpoint and under constant threat of execution.
For those four and a half months he was living, eating, travelling and sleeping with al-Qaeda while desperate behind-the-scenes negotiations took place to try to free him and his assistant, Louis Guay.
The following is a transcript of Peter Mansbridge's interview with Fowler, which aired Tuesday, Sept. 8, on The National. It's a heart-stopping look inside a kidnapping by the world's most feared terrorist organization.
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MANSBRIDGE: Well, it's been a couple of months now since the ordeal ended. How are you?
FOWLER: I think pretty good. I just heard a story yesterday from the UN of a guy who was taken about the same time as we were in Pakistan and Baluchistan. He thought he was pretty good and five months later, without any notice, fell into pieces. So I have to give you a rather immediate and temporary answer: so far, so good.
MANSBRIDGE: Do you still, though, have moments every day, every couple of days, where you think of it unprompted? In other words, nobody asks you, you just suddenly start thinking about it?
FOWLER: I do. And all kinds of things trigger it. The, perhaps the strangest moment, and I was talking to my pal, Louis Guay, who was in this with me, the other day and we both have exactly the same reaction. It's, it's unreal. I mean did it happen? Was it really like that? Or am I, am I imagining some of the stuff? And then suddenly, you'll get another memory that will remind you that it was exactly like that.
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MANSBRIDGE VOICE-OVER: Bob Fowler was no ordinary Canadian diplomat. For decades he was on the leading edge of this country's foreign initiatives. Regularly at the right hand of prime ministers, he had worked his way upward through the often treacherous paths of the Ottawa bureaucracy. His supporters praised him for his intellect and compassion. His foes saw him as stubborn and controlling. Then, in 2006, at 62, he retired with honour and accolades.
But "retirement" wasn't really in Bob Fowler's vocabulary. Africa was. And it was to the continent — a career-long passion for Fowler — that the United Nations asked him to go. A nasty dispute over mineral resources between the government of Niger and the rebel movement MNJ as the mission. Finding peace was the challenge.
But instead, on a lazy Sunday afternoon just before Christmas, along Niger's only paved highway, just 30 minutes outside the capital, Bob Fowler's world turned into a nightmare.
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FOWLER: Suddenly there's a truck passing us. We're going really fast and he's going faster, and he's not a Lamborghini, he is a truck. What's wrong with this picture, you know?
MANSBRIDGE: You knew there was something wrong with the picture?
FOWLER: No, not yet. No, except — well I remember — he goes by and immediately slices across the road, right in front of us. I mean whoa, I mean really dangerous, scary and our driver and immediately swings out to pass him, at which point he swings out again. Then I knew we were in trouble.
Before we had quite stopped ... the two guys, African faces, in the back of the pickup truck are vaulting over the edge. One guy is vaulting over the edge with his Kalashnikov high and the other guy is aiming with his Kalashnikov aiming from the back of the truck straight at the driver, from four metres away.
MANSBRIDGE: So you know at this point there's no doubt what's happening?
FOWLER: There's no doubt what's happening, and I think — this is the greatest damn cliché of all time — how can this be happening to me? I mean I've spent a lot of time in Africa. This is the safe eight per cent of the country. This is where the embassy has their picnics on Sunday. Why? This is not right. What's happening? ... I think the thing took from 35 to 45 seconds from beginning to end.
MANSBRIDGE: From the beginning ...?
FOWLER: From as soon as I realized this is not a, you know, idiots on the road, this is something else. To our being in the other truck, forced to lie down under a very smelly, oily blanket with, with these two guys sitting on top of us, the car having done a 180-degree turn and streak in the other direction. That was 45 seconds.
How well was this thing set up? There there are indications it was very well set up.
I have to admit, it was also very efficiently executed. The offside rear door was torn open. Louis was being sort of frog-marched behind the driver in front. Both of [them] were sort of being thrown into the car in front. Louis was sort of raked across his eyebrow and eye with the foreside of an AK. I was on the other side, on the inside. And wondered if I should, could make a run for it. Would they shoot if I made a run for it?
Would I be abandoning Louis and the driver if I did? By the time I'd articulated the questions, I was in the back of that truck and, and we did this sort of screeching 180 [degree turn]. And as I was being forced down, I remember going now the other way, looking and seeing our car there and being 100 per cent certain that there'd be one of their guys about to leap into it and drive it off. A very valuable asset.
As we now know, as I found out only when I got out, they left the car there, seven hours on the road, with three of its four doors open, the engine running and the blinker on.
MANSBRIDGE: One of the questions that sort of has nagged some about the moment of capture is why there were just you, Louis Guay and the driver in the vehicle — and why there wasn't some protection.
FOWLER: Right, yeah.
MANSBRIDGE: You've been around and you've been in senior levels of the bureaucracy and with the UN. You've obviously had training on these things. I appreciate that this particular area was somewhat considered safe, but you would have been a profile target. Why was there no security?
FOWLER: Sorry. It wasn't — it wasn't considered somewhat safe, it was safe. It was...
MANSBRIDGE: But it wasn't.
FOWLER: Well no, it wasn't. And let's get to that.
But the Canadian Embassy had been picnicking there the week before. The entire government was going up that road in two days. There were police posts along the road and it was in the eight per cent of the country that was green on the UN security map.
I have been in less safe circumstances with no protection. The deal with the UN, and really with countries as well, is you leave security to the host country. And the way we would do the itinerary is that we send that to the UN office in which we said here are the things we want to do and, over the weekend, we want to get out in the countryside a little bit and we want to go to this mine.
[We] provided that to the UN offices, the UN then provides that to the government, and they — I guess because of the speculation, you talked about it. I checked when I got back and I got the emails from the UN office saying yes, further to your question, I can confirm that we have passed your itinerary to all the appropriate people. So there's no doubt they had.
I don't know if this is right, Peter, but I think I'm probably the most senior UN creature that they have seized.
MANSBRIDGE: But the issue becomes: If they knew who they were grabbing, they'd find exactly where you are.
FOWLER: Exactly.
MANSBRIDGE: And the other people who know that are everybody — a lot of people, I guess, at the end of the day — who got the UN itinerary.
FOWLER: You got it.
MANSBRIDGE: And you've got a government that probably didn't like too much the whole idea of why you were there in the first place.
FOWLER: They hated my mission.
MANSBRIDGE: Because it could only be a cost to them in the long run. Any deal would be a cost to them.
FOWLER: Yeah. The president of Niger, whose name is Tanja. It was clear from the first time I met him in August that he was offended, annoyed, embarrassed by the fact that the secretary general of the UN had seen fit to appoint a special envoy for his country. In fact, some of the stuff I've read since I got out, with Niger government spokespeople talking about my mission. They said I was there to see if I could get hold of illicit arms trafficking, which was not my mission.
My mission was to get the government to make peace with the rebels. As long as there was no peace with the rebels, the enemy was at the gate, right? If al-Qaeda is taking people on the outskirts of the city, the enemy's really at the gate. And governance of national security makes sense, right?
So I don't know who shopped me. I know somebody shopped me. Who could it be? It could be the government of Niger. Could be an al-Qaeda sympathizer in the UN office in Niger. In the UN office in West Africa. In the secretariat building in New York. All of them had my agenda, my itinerary.
MANSBRIDGE: Did you have your passport with you?
FOWLER: No, I had nothing, which drove them crazy. Drove them absolutely crazy. One guy gave me hell. I mean it's irresponsible to go out without your documents. Who do you think you are?
MANSBRIDGE: Did you tell them who you were?
FOWLER: Yes, immediately I told them who I was, and they were not ...
MANSBRIDGE: And why you were there?
FOWLER: No, we didn't get into any of that.
MANSBRIDGE: No, but I mean when you said 'I'm Robert Fowler, I'm the UN special representative.'?
FOWLER: Yes.
MANSBRIDGE: You said that?
FOWLER: I said that. They asked me who I was and I said that. And they were — they were unsurprised by that. And then Louis had his UN laissez passer with him, which is the UN passport, and my laissez passer and my Canadian passport were sitting in my hotel safe.
They took Louis's watch and his stuff in his pocket. They for some reason didn't take my inexpensive travelling watch. Made for muggers.
MANSBRIDGE: They could tell a knockoff.
FOWLER: Yeah, that's right, exactly.... So they do this and they're kind of milling around a bit. And I have a moment, just a moment, and I said Louis, tell them the truth. No matter what happens, tell them the truth. You don't have anything that is so important to protect that it's worth your life.
MANSBRIDGE: Now why did you say that?
FOWLER: Because I said if you start telling lies, you will get caught up in your own webs and you will lose any ability. I didn't say all that. That's what was in my mind.
MANSBRIDGE: But were you saying that because that's Bob Fowler thinking or were you saying that because that's the training you get?
FOWLER: No, that's me thinking.
MANSBRIDGE: Because you must have had training.
FOWLER: Nobody's ever trained me in being a hostage.
MANSBRIDGE: Really?
FOWLER: No.
MANSBRIDGE: The senior levels that you were at never had any training like that?
FOWLER: No, never. But that was reading spy books and watching movies. And maybe good sense.
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FOWLER: Somewhere very late, I mean four or five in the morning, we, we stopped. A blanket is thrown on the ground and we're told 'rest,' and the driver gets out of his car, crawls under the truck to rest. One of the soldiers rests, and the other one is the sentry on guard, and he's making tea.
CBC News has obtained this cellphone picture. This is the first time an image of Robert Fowler in captivity has been made public. I can't lie down on the rug because my back hurts too much. And I then walk towards this guy and he's crouched over this tiny fire, making his tea and he looks up and says, have you figured out who we are yet? And I very tentatively and with no conviction at all said well, I mean are you the MNJ? And he gives me a disdainful look and says, in effect, I mean what would I be doing hanging around with those turkeys, you know? I'm Senegalese. I have nothing to do with Niger politics.
He didn't say all that, he just said 'I'm Senegalese'. And I said 'oh'. And then he says: 'We are al-Qaeda. And the bottom of my world fell out.'
And … I'm a guy who is constantly sort of running stupid statistics in his mind, you know? I mean will that light change before I count to 10? And what are the odds of my doing something before the first snow flies or you know, that sort of thing.
So what are the odds I'm going to come out of this alive was obviously a big one. And at that point, I figured five per cent because lower was too depressing. But 'we are al-Qaeda', and there then, Peter, begins all your calculations earlier.
So they're al-Qaeda, and what is the UN going to do vis-a-vis al-Qaeda? What's the government of Canada going to do vis-a-vis al-Qaeda? What's the West going to do?
MANSBRIDGE: Did they want you because you were UN or because you were Canadian?
FOWLER: UN.
MANSBRIDGE: Did the Canadian issue come up at all?
FOWLER: No, I think it was an added bonus for them. But they — but I think this all goes back to their mission and whether or not we were a target of opportunity or a targeted mission. So it was a big UN guy is what, is what they grabbed.
After 'we are al-Qaeda', and we're travelling more and more — ever further northward, and no doubt feeling low, damaged and not very courageous, I asked the driver, is it your intention to execute us?
I don't know why I asked that. I'm not sure I really wanted the answer. But nevertheless. But he reacted with very satisfying anger, sort of saying 'nah'. I mean, he said: 'Listen, my mission was to capture you. If my mission had been to execute you, you'd be dead. So don't give me any more of that crap.' I mean that was the idea, which again I found a rather happy response.
MANSBRIDGE: You believed him?
FOWLER: Oh boy, that's a big question then and at any future point. I certainly wanted to believe him, so that would do for a while. Yeah.
MANSBRIDGE VOICE-OVER: The chaotic first days stretched into weeks. After 56 hours of brutal off-road driving, a trip that fractured one of Fowler's vertebrae, the hostages were shuffled from camp to camp in northern Mali. All the while, he was held at gunpoint by 20 insurgents, one as young as seven.
Camp life became routine. Fowler wore out his shoes through daily exercise, repairing them with thorns. And he secretly kept track of days by marking his leather belt.
MANSBRIDGE: Tell me about movie night.
FOWLER: As night falls they take three spare tires and pile them one on top of the other, haul out their nifty laptop, plug it into the engine, to the cigarette lighter in the engine compartment, and fire it up and we watch what we call TV night. They would have [a video view] of sniper rifles as they sort of popped the heads off GIs in Iraq and Afghanistan, endless IEDs [improvised explosive devices] blowing up Humvees, trucks and convoys in Iraq and Afghanistan. Lots of suicide bombers crashing through gates blowing up, some buildings … and every time this would happen the audience would scream and wasn't that great.
MANSBRIDGE: Every time there was a TV night they'd play the same?
FOWLER: Oh no, sometimes they had new [movies]. Al-Qaeda central would send them a new hot DVD. Actually the only time I saw real excitement was a guy running in from with a new DVD. Boy, you know we have a bestseller tonight. And they would, it was clearly these were propaganda films, rather good production values. I mean they were well made. It was to pump up the boys. I mean to remind them of what it was all about, and they were Mujahadeen and death in the calls is what it's all about and we will prevail. I eventually refused to go to TV night, but created a bit of an issue, but not a huge issue, a bit of an issue. I said I had seen the twin towers come down 400 times. I don't need to see them again.
MANSBRIDGE: Now you became featured in videos yourself?
FOWLER: Yes.
MANSBRIDGE: There were three in total?
FOWLER: Four actually.
MANSBRIDGE: Four. And now the idea initially was 'proof of life' videos?
FOWLER: Yes that's certainly what I thought. They're not all the same. But the first one we did on Day 5. We were ushered into a tent. The only time we were ever in a tent was to make videos. I didn't like tents. Every time I walked into a tent I remembered Daniel Pearl and it wasn't a good memory.
Each one was different, very different. The first one was what I kind of expected to be; it was proof of life. I'd seen the movies. I knew that that's what had to happen and I knew that that meant my family would know that I was captured and they were not going to be real happy about the al-Qaeda part of it.
I think I was suggesting to you they're not technically incompetent. I mean just a total contradiction of these guys festooned with sat phones, cell phones, GPSs, walkie-talkies, video cameras and laptops — whose minds are 15 centuries away, whose weapons are a couple of generations old, and who really wish they didn't have rifles and could get back to the days of the scimitar and saber. Strange contradictions.
Video three was very different. Somber. No backdrop when we got in there. Hands behind our back. Blindfolded for the first time. And we're told 'don't speak'. You have no speaking role. Don't speak.
And all I know of that video was I guy intoning behind me a long screed in Arabic with lots of references to al-Qaeda, Jihad, Muhjahadeen, Allah and Allahu Akhbar and blindfolds came off, we were taken out of the tent, taken back to our tree and left alone, absolutely alone. Nobody talked to us, nobody came near us.
And I did not feel happy about that. I didn't know what had happened. I guessed — and does it happen I think I guessed absolutely accurately — it was a death threat, an ultimatum.
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Robert Fowler enlevé
Automatically translated into French thanks to WorldLingo
Transcription EXCLUSIVE de NOUVELLES
de CBC : Le diplomate canadien d'entrevue
de Robert Fowler parle avec Peter Mansbridge au sujet de son bout d'épreuve
d'abduction mis à jour : Mardi 8 septembre 2009 | 10:57 P.M. ET les nouvelles Robert
Fowler de Comments0Recommend6CBC parle de comment il a été capturé, de ce qui est arrivé à lui en captivité et comment il a été eventualy libéré dans une exclusivité de nouvelles de CBC. (Nouvelles de Tom Sharina/CBC) c'est l'histoire incalculable du diplomate canadien Robert Fowler, qui, pendant 130 jours plus tôt cette année, a été tenu au canon du pistolet et sous la menace constante de l'exécution.
Pour ces quatre et une moitié de mois il était vivant, mangeant, voyageant et dormant avec du l'Al-Qaeda tandis que les négociations désespérées de derrière-le-scènes avaient lieu pour essayer de libérer lui et son aide, Louis Guay.
Ce qui suit est une transcription d'entrevue de Peter Mansbridge avec Fowler, qui a aéré mardi, septembre. 8, sur le national. C'est un intérieur de coeur-arrêt de regard par kidnapping par l'organisation du terroriste la plus crainte du monde.
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MANSBRIDGE : Bien, c'a été un couple des mois maintenant depuis que l'épreuve a fini. Comment allez-vous ?
FOWLER : Je pense très bon. Je juste ai entendu une histoire hier de l'ONU d'un type qui a été pris du temps à peu près identique pendant que nous étions au Pakistan et le Baluchistan. Il a pensé qu'il était très bon et cinq mois plus tard, sans n'importe quelle communication préalable, est tombé dans des morceaux. Ainsi je dois te donner une réponse plutôt immédiate et provisoire : jusqu'ici, si bon.
MANSBRIDGE : Vous néanmoins, bien que, ont les moments journaliers, chaque couple des jours, où vous pensent à lui unprompted ? En d'autres termes, personne ne te demande que, vous commencez juste soudainement à penser cela ?
FOWLER : Je. Et toutes sortes de déclenchement de choses il. , Peut-être le moment le plus étrange, et moi parlait à mon pal, Louis Guay, qui était en cela avec moi, l'autre jour et nous tous les deux avons exactement la même réaction. Il est, il est irréel. Je veux dire il me suis produit ? Était-il vraiment comme celui ? Ou est-ce que je suis, AM I imaginant une partie de la substance ? Et puis soudainement, vous obtiendrez une autre mémoire qui vous rappellera qu'elle était exactement comme celle.
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MANSBRIDGE VOICE-OVER : Bob Fowler n'était aucun diplomate canadien ordinaire. Pendant des décennies il était sur le principal bord des initiatives étrangères de ce pays. Régulièrement à la main droite de premiers ministres, il avait travaillé sa manière vers le haut par les chemins souvent déloyaux de la bureaucratie d'Ottawa. Ses défenseurs l'ont félicité pour son intellect et compassion. Ses ennemis ont vu lui comme têtu et le contrôle. Puis, en 2006, à 62, il s'est retiré avec l'honneur et les accolades.
Mais la « retraite » n'était pas vraiment en vocabulaire de Bob Fowler. L'Afrique était. Et il était au continent - une carrière-longue passion pour Fowler que les Nations Unies lui ont demandées d'aller. Ressources minérales d'un excédent méchant de conflit entre le gouvernement du Niger et le mouvement rebelle MNJ comme mission. La conclusion de la paix était le défi.
Mais à la place, dimanche après-midi paresseux juste avant Noël, le long de la seule route pavée du Niger, juste 30 minutes en dehors du capital, monde de Bob Fowler se sont transformées en cauchemar.
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FOWLER : Il y a soudainement un camion nous passant. Nous allons vraiment rapides et il va plus rapidement, et il n'est pas un Lamborghini, il est un camion. Quel est le problème avec cette image, savez-vous ?
MANSBRIDGE : Vous avez su qu'il y avait quelque chose mal avec l'image ?
FOWLER : Non, pas encore. Non, excepté - bon je me rappelle - lui va près et immédiatement les tranches à travers la route, droite devant nous. Je veux dire le whoa, je signifie vraiment dangereux, effrayant et notre conducteur et balance immédiatement dehors pour le passer, lequel au point il balance dehors encore. Alors j'ai su que nous avions des ennuis.
Avant que nous nous soyons tout arrêtés… les deux types, visages africains, dans le dos du camion sautent au-dessus du bord. Un type saute au-dessus du bord avec sa kalachnikov haut et l'autre type vise avec sa kalachnikov visant du dos du camion directement le conducteur, de quatre mètres de distance.
MANSBRIDGE : Ainsi vous savez qu'en ce moment il n'y a aucun doute ce qui se produit ?
FOWLER : Il n'y a aucun doute ce qui se produit, et est-ce que je peut penser - c'est le plus grand fichu cliché de toute l'heure - comment ceci arriver à moi ? Je veux dire que j'ai dépensé beaucoup de temps en Afrique. C'est les huit pour cent sûr du pays. C'est où l'ambassade a leurs pique-niques le dimanche. Pourquoi ? Ce n'est pas exact. Que se produit ? ... Je pense que la chose a pris de 35 à 45 secondes du commencement jusqu'à la fin.
MANSBRIDGE : Du commencement… ?
FOWLER : Dès que j'ai réalisé de ceci n'est pas a, vous savent, les idiots sur la route, ceci est autre chose. À notre devoir dans l'autre camion, obligatoire se coucher sous une couverture très smelly et huileuse avec, avec ces deux types s'asseyant sur nous, la voiture ayant fait un tour et une strie de 180 degrés dans l'autre direction. C'était de 45 secondes.
À quel point cette chose a-t-elle été établie ? Il là y a des indications qu'il a été très bien établi.
Je dois admettre, il également ai été très efficacement exécuté. La porte hors jeu arrière était ouverte déchiré. Louis était sorte de grenouille-marché derrière le conducteur dans l'avant. Toutes les deux de [elles] étaient sorte d'lancement dans la voiture dans l'avant. Louis était sorte de ratissé à travers son sourcil et oeil avec le foreside d'un AK. J'étais de l'autre côté, sur l'intérieur. Et demandé si je, pourrait faire une course pour elle. Tireraient-ils si je faisais une course pour elle ?
Est-ce que j'abandonnerais Louis et le conducteur si je ? Avant que j'aie articulé les questions, j'étais dans le dos de ce camion et, et nous avons fait cette sorte de pousser des cris perçants 180 [tour de degré]. Et car j'étais forcé vers le bas, je me rappelle d'aller maintenant l'autre manière, de regarder et voir notre voiture là et d'être de 100 pour cent de certain qu'il devrait y avoir de l'un de leurs types environ à sauter dans lui et pour le chasser. Des capitaux très valables.
Comme nous connaissons maintenant, comme j'ai découvert seulement quand je suis sorti, ils à gauche la voiture là, sept heures sur la route, avec trois de ses quatre portes s'ouvrent, le fonctionnement de moteur et le feu clignotant dessus.
MANSBRIDGE : Une des questions dont la sorte en a harcelé au sujet du moment de la capture est pourquoi il y avait juste vous, Louis Guay et le conducteur dans le véhicule - et pourquoi il n'y avait pas une certaine protection.
FOWLER : Droite, ouais.
MANSBRIDGE : Vous avez été autour et vous avez été dans les niveaux aînés de la bureaucratie et avec l'ONU. Vous avez évidemment eu la formation sur ces choses. J'apprécie que ce secteur particulier a été légèrement considéré coffre-fort, mais vous auriez été une cible de profil. Pourquoi y avait-il aucune sécurité ?
FOWLER : Désolé. Il n'était pas - on ne l'a pas considéré quelque peu sûr, il était sûr. Il était…
MANSBRIDGE : Mais il n'était pas.
FOWLER : Jaillissent le non, il n'était pas. Et obtenons à cela.
Mais l'ambassade canadienne avait pique-niqué là la semaine avant. Le gouvernement entier montait cette route en deux jours. Il y avait des poteaux de police le long de la route et elle était en huit pour cent du pays qui était vert sur la carte de sécurité de l'ONU.
J'ai été dans des circonstances moins sûres sans la protection. L'affaire avec l'ONU, et vraiment avec des pays aussi bien, est toi sécurité de congé au pays d'accueil. Et la manière que nous ferions l'itinéraire est que nous envoyons cela au bureau de l'ONU dans lequel nous avons dit voici les choses nous voulons faire et, au cours du week-end, nous voulons sortir dans la campagne un peu et nous voulons aller au ce mien.
[Nous] à condition que aux bureaux de l'ONU, l'ONU fournit alors cela au gouvernement, et eux - je devine en raison de la spéculation, vous ai parlé de elle. J'ai vérifié quand je suis revenu et j'ai obtenu les email du bureau de l'ONU me disant oui, plus loin à votre question, peux confirmer que nous avons passé votre itinéraire à toutes personnes appropriées. Donc il n'y a aucun doute qu'ils ont eu.
Je ne sais pas si c'est exact, Peter, mais je pense que je suis probablement la créature de l'ONU la plus aînée qu'ils ont saisie.
MANSBRIDGE : Mais la question devient : S'ils savaient qui ils saisissaient, ils trouveraient exactement où vous êtes.
FOWLER : Exactement.
MANSBRIDGE : Et l'autre peuple qui savent cela est tout le monde - un bon nombre de gens, je devine, à la fin du jour - qui a obtenu l'ONU itinéraire.
FOWLER : Vous l'avez obtenu.
MANSBRIDGE : Et vous avez un gouvernement qui n'a pas aimé probablement trop de l'idée même de pourquoi vous étiez là en premier lieu.
FOWLER : Ils ont détesté ma mission.
MANSBRIDGE : Puisque ce pourrait seulement être un coût à eux à la longue. N'importe quelle affaire serait un coût à eux.
FOWLER : Ouais. Le président du Niger, dont le nom est Tanja. Il était clair de la première fois que je l'ai rencontré en août qu'il a été offensé, gêné, embarrassé par le fait que le sécrétaire général de l'ONU avait vu l'ajustement pour nommer un délégué spécial pour son pays. En fait, une partie de la substance que j'ai lue depuis que je suis sorti, avec le spokespeople de gouvernement du Niger parlant de ma mission. Ils ont dit que j'étais là pour voir si je pourrais mettre la main sur les bras illicites trafiquant, qui n'était pas ma mission.
Ma mission était d'obtenir le gouvernement pour faire la paix avec les rebelles. Tant que il n'y avait aucune paix avec les rebelles, l'ennemi était-il à la porte, droite ? Si Al-Qaeda prend des personnes sur les périphéries de la ville, l'ennemi vraiment à la porte. Et gouvernement des marques sens, droite de sécurité nationale ?
Ainsi je ne sais pas qui a fait des emplettes je. Je sais que quelqu'un a fait des emplettes je. Qui a pu il être ? C'a pu être le gouvernement du Niger. Pourrait être un sympathisant d'Al-Qaeda dans le bureau de l'ONU au Niger. Dans le bureau de l'ONU en Afrique occidentale. Dans le bâtiment de secrétariat à New York. Tous ont eu mon ordre du jour, mon itinéraire.
MANSBRIDGE : Avez-vous votre passeport avec toi ?
FOWLER : Non, je n'ai eu rien, qui les a conduits fous. Les a conduits absolument fous. Un type m'a donné l'enfer. Je veux dire qu'il est irresponsable pour sortir sans vos documents. Qui vous pensez-vous êtes-vous ?
MANSBRIDGE : Leur avez-vous dit qui vous étiez ?
FOWLER : Oui, immédiatement je leur ai dit que qui j'étais, et ils n'étaient pas…
MANSBRIDGE : Et pourquoi vous y avait-il ?
FOWLER : Non, nous ne sommes entrés dans aucune de cela.
MANSBRIDGE : Le non, mais moi signifient quand vous avez dit que « je suis Robert Fowler, je suis le représentant spécial de l'ONU. » ?
FOWLER : Oui.
MANSBRIDGE : Vous avez dit cela ?
FOWLER : J'ai dit cela. Ils m'ont demandés que qui j'étais et j'ai dit cela. Et ils étaient - ils étaient unsurprised par celui. Et alors Louis a eu son passant de laissez de l'ONU avec lui, qui est le passeport de l'ONU, et mon passant de laissez et mon passeport canadien s'asseyaient dans mon coffre-fort d'hôtel.
Ils ont pris la montre et sa substance de Louis dans sa poche. Ils pour quelque raison n'ont pas pris ma montre de déplacement peu coûteuse. Dirigé vers des agresseurs.
MANSBRIDGE : Ils ont pu indiquer un knockoff.
FOWLER : Ouais, c'est exact, exactement…. Ainsi ils font ceci et ils sont genre de fraisage autour d'un peu. Et j'ai un moment, juste un moment, et j'ai dit Louis, leur dis la vérité. N'importe ce que se produit, dites-leur la vérité. Vous n'avez rien il est si important protéger que qu'il vaut la peine votre vie.
MANSBRIDGE : Maintenant pourquoi avez-vous dit cela ?
FOWLER : Puisque j'ai dit si vous commencez à dire des mensonges, vous vous ferez attraper vers le haut en vos propres Web et vous perdrez n'importe quelle capacité. Je n'ai pas dit tout cela. C'est ce qui était dans mon esprit.
MANSBRIDGE : Mais disiez-vous que parce que c'est Bob Fowler pensant ou vous disiez que parce que c'est la formation vous obtenez ?
FOWLER : Le non, celui est moi pensant.
MANSBRIDGE : Puisque vous devez avoir eu la formation.
FOWLER : Personne m'a jamais formé en étant un otage.
MANSBRIDGE : Vraiment ?
FOWLER : Non.
MANSBRIDGE : Les niveaux d'aîné que vous étiez à non jamais eu n'importe quelle formation comme cela ?
FOWLER : Non, jamais. Mais c'était des livres d'espion de lecture et des films de observation. Et peut-être bon sens.
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FOWLER : Quelque part très tard, je veux dire quatre ou cinq le matin, nous, nous me suis arrêté. Une couverture est jetée sur la terre et nous sommes dits que le « repos, » et le conducteur sort de sa voiture, rampe sous le camion au repos. Un des soldats se repose, et l'autre est la sentinelle sur la garde, et il fait le thé.
Les nouvelles de CBC ont obtenu cette image de cellphone. C'est la première fois qu'une image de Robert Fowler en captivité a été faite à public. Je ne peux pas me coucher sur la couverture parce que mon dos blesse trop. Et je marche alors vers ce type et il s'est-il tapi au-dessus de ce feu minuscule est-ce que, faisant son thé et lui et, vous recherche dit ont figuré dehors qui nous sommes encore ? Et I très à titre d'essai et sans la conviction du tout dit bien, je veux dire suis toi le MNJ ? Et il me donne un regard dédaigneux et me dit, en effet, signifient ce qui I ferait traîner avec ces dindes, vous savent ? Je suis sénégalais. Je n'ai rien à faire avec la politique du Niger.
Il n'a pas dit tout cela, il a juste dit que « je suis sénégalais ». Et j'ai dit le « OH ». Et alors il dit : 'Nous sommes Al-Qaeda. Et le fond de mon monde a tombé. '
Et… je suis un type qui est constamment sorte de courir des statistiques stupides dans son esprit, vous sais ? Je veux dire que changement de lumière avant que je compte à 10 ? Et ce qui sont la chance de ma faisant quelque chose avant que la première neige vole ou vous savez, cette sorte de chose.
Ainsi ce qui sont la chance je vais sortir de ce vivant était évidemment grande. Et à ce point, je schéma cinq pour cent parce qu'inférieur enfonçait trop. Mais « nous sommes Al-Qaeda », et là puis, Peter, commence tous vos calculs plus tôt.
Ainsi ils sont Al-Qaeda, et quel est l'ONU allant faire vis-à-vis d'Al-Qaeda ? Que le gouvernement du Canada va-t-il faire vis-à-vis d'Al-Qaeda ? Que l'ouest va-t-il faire ?
MANSBRIDGE : Vous ont-ils voulu parce que vous étiez l'ONU ou parce que vous étiez canadien ?
FOWLER : L'ONU.
MANSBRIDGE : La question canadienne a-t-elle été soulevée du tout ?
FOWLER : Non, je pense que c'était une bonification supplémentaire pour eux. Mais ils - mais je pense que ce tout va de nouveau à leur mission et si nous étions une cible d'occasion ou une mission visée. Ainsi c'était un grand type de l'ONU est est ce qui, ce qu'elles ont saisi.
Après que « nous soient Al-Qaeda », et nous sont voyageant de plus en plus - jamais promeuvent au nord, et aucun doute se sentir bas, endommagé et pas très courageux, j'a-t-il demandé le conducteur, est-il votre intention de nous exécuter ?
Je ne sais pas pourquoi j'ai demandé cela. Je ne suis pas sûr j'ai vraiment voulu la réponse. Mais néanmoins. But he reacted with very satisfying anger, sort of saying 'nah'. I mean, he said: 'Listen, my mission was to capture you. If my mission had been to execute you, you'd be dead. So don't give me any more of that crap.' I mean that was the idea, which again I found a rather happy response.
MANSBRIDGE: You believed him?
FOWLER: Oh boy, that's a big question then and at any future point. I certainly wanted to believe him, so that would do for a while. Yeah.
MANSBRIDGE VOICE-OVER: The chaotic first days stretched into weeks. After 56 hours of brutal off-road driving, a trip that fractured one of Fowler's vertebrae, the hostages were shuffled from camp to camp in northern Mali. All the while, he was held at gunpoint by 20 insurgents, one as young as seven.
Camp life became routine. Fowler wore out his shoes through daily exercise, repairing them with thorns. And he secretly kept track of days by marking his leather belt.
MANSBRIDGE: Tell me about movie night.
FOWLER: As night falls they take three spare tires and pile them one on top of the other, haul out their nifty laptop, plug it into the engine, to the cigarette lighter in the engine compartment, and fire it up and we watch what we call TV night. They would have [a video view] of sniper rifles as they sort of popped the heads off GIs in Iraq and Afghanistan, endless IEDs [improvised explosive devices] blowing up Humvees, trucks and convoys in Iraq and Afghanistan. Lots of suicide bombers crashing through gates blowing up, some buildings … and every time this would happen the audience would scream and wasn't that great.
MANSBRIDGE: Every time there was a TV night they'd play the same?
FOWLER: Oh no, sometimes they had new [movies]. Al-Qaeda central would send them a new hot DVD. Actually the only time I saw real excitement was a guy running in from with a new DVD. Boy, you know we have a bestseller tonight. And they would, it was clearly these were propaganda films, rather good production values. I mean they were well made. It was to pump up the boys. I mean to remind them of what it was all about, and they were Mujahadeen and death in the calls is what it's all about and we will prevail. I eventually refused to go to TV night, but created a bit of an issue, but not a huge issue, a bit of an issue. I said I had seen the twin towers come down 400 times. I don't need to see them again.
MANSBRIDGE: Now you became featured in videos yourself?
FOWLER: Yes.
MANSBRIDGE: There were three in total?
FOWLER: Four actually.
MANSBRIDGE: Four. And now the idea initially was 'proof of life' videos?
FOWLER: Yes that's certainly what I thought. They're not all the same. But the first one we did on Day 5. We were ushered into a tent. The only time we were ever in a tent was to make videos. I didn't like tents. Every time I walked into a tent I remembered Daniel Pearl and it wasn't a good memory.
Each one was different, very different. The first one was what I kind of expected to be; it was proof of life. I'd seen the movies. I knew that that's what had to happen and I knew that that meant my family would know that I was captured and they were not going to be real happy about the al-Qaeda part of it.
I think I was suggesting to you they're not technically incompetent. I mean just a total contradiction of these guys festooned with sat phones, cell phones, GPSs, walkie-talkies, video cameras and laptops — whose minds are 15 centuries away, whose weapons are a couple of generations old, and who really wish they didn't have rifles and could get back to the days of the scimitar and saber. Strange contradictions.
Video three was very different. Somber. No backdrop when we got in there. Hands behind our back. Blindfolded for the first time. And we're told 'don't speak'. You have no speaking role. Don't speak.
And all I know of that video was I guy intoning behind me a long screed in Arabic with lots of references to al-Qaeda, Jihad, Muhjahadeen, Allah and Allahu Akhbar and blindfolds came off, we were taken out of the tent, taken back to our tree and left alone, absolutely alone. Nobody talked to us, nobody came near us.
And I did not feel happy about that. I didn't know what had happened. I guessed — and does it happen I think I guessed absolutely accurately — it was a death threat, an ultimatum.
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Roberto Fowler secuestrado
Automatically translated into Spanish thanks to WorldLingo
Transcripción EXCLUSIVA de las NOTICIAS
de CBC: El diplomata canadiense de la entrevista
de Roberto Fowler habla con Peter Mansbridge sobre su último de la prueba dura
de la abducción puesto al día: Martes 8 de septiembre de 2009 | 10:57 P.M. ET las noticias Roberto
Fowler de Comments0Recommend6CBC habla de cómo lo capturaron, de qué le sucedieron en cautiverio y cómo él eventualy fue lanzado en una exclusiva de las noticias de CBC. (Noticias de Tom Sharina/CBC) ésta es la historia del untold del diplomata canadiense Roberto Fowler, que, por 130 días a principios de este año, fue sostenido en el gunpoint y bajo amenaza constante de la ejecución.
Para esos cuatro y una mitad de los meses él era que vivía, que comía, que viajaba y durmiente con el al-Qaeda mientras que las negociaciones desesperadas de las detrás--escenas ocurrieron para intentar liberar a lo y a su ayudante, Louis Guay.
Lo que sigue es una transcripción de la entrevista de Peter Mansbridge con Fowler, que ventiló martes, sept. 8, en el nacional. Es una mirada corazón-que para dentro de un secuestro por la organización temida del terrorista del mundo.
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MANSBRIDGE: Bien, ha sido un par de meses ahora desde que la prueba dura terminó. ¿Cómo es usted?
FOWLER: Pienso bastante bueno. Acabo de oír una historia ayer de la O.N.U de un individuo que fue tomado tiempo casi igual mientras que estábamos en Paquistán y Baluchistan. Él pensó que él era bastante bueno y cinco meses más adelante, sin ningún aviso, bajó en pedazos. Tan tengo que darle una respuesta algo inmediata y temporal: hasta ahora, tan bueno.
MANSBRIDGE: ¿Usted sin embargo, aunque, tienen momentos diarios, cada par de días, donde usted piensan en él unprompted? ¿Es decir nadie le pregunta que, usted apenas comienza repentinamente a pensar de él?
FOWLER: . Y todas las clases de disparador de las cosas él. , Quizás el momento más extraño, y yo hablaba con mi amigacho, Louis Guay, que estaba en esto con mí, el otro día y ambos tenemos exactamente la misma reacción. Es, él es irreal. ¿Significo él sucedí? ¿Estaba realmente como ése? ¿O soy, I imaginando algo de la materia? Y entonces repentinamente, usted conseguirá otra memoria que le recuerde que estaba exactamente como ésa.
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MANSBRIDGE VOICE-OVER: Bob Fowler no era ningún diplomata canadiense ordinario. Por décadas él estaba en el borde principal de las iniciativas extranjeras de este país. Regularmente en la mano derecha de primeros ministros, él había trabajado su manera hacia arriba a través de las trayectorias a menudo traidoras de la burocracia de Ottawa. Sus partidarios lo elogiaron para su intelecto y compasión. Sus enemigos vieron lo como obstinado y controlar. Entonces, en 2006, en 62, él se retiró con honor y espaldarazos.
Pero el “retiro” no estaba realmente en el vocabulario de Bob Fowler. África era. Y estaba al continente - una pasión carrera-larga para Fowler que los Naciones Unidas pidieron que él fuera. Recursos mineral de un excedente repugnante del conflicto entre el gobierno de Niger y el movimiento rebelde MNJ como la misión. Encontrar paz era el desafío.
Sino que por el contrario, en una tarde perezosa de domingo momentos antes de Navidad, a lo largo de la única carretera pavimentada de Niger, apenas 30 minutos fuera del capital, mundo de Bob Fowler dieron vuelta en una pesadilla.
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FOWLER: Hay repentinamente un carro que nos pasa. Vamos realmente rápidos y él va más rápidamente, y él no es un Lamborghini, él es un carro. ¿Cuál es incorrecto con este cuadro, usted sabe?
MANSBRIDGE: ¿Usted sabía que había algo mal con el cuadro?
FOWLER: No, no todavía. No, excepto - bien recuerdo - él va cerca e inmediatamente las rebanadas a través del camino, la derecha delante de nosotros. Significo whoa, yo significo realmente peligroso, asustadizo y nuestro conductor y hago pivotar inmediatamente hacia fuera para pasarlo, en que punto él hace pivotar hacia fuera otra vez. Entonces sabía que estábamos en apuro.
Antes de que hubiéramos parado absolutamente… los dos individuos, caras africanas, en la parte posteriora de la furgoneta están saltando sobre el borde. Un individuo está saltando sobre el borde con su Kalashnikov arriba y el otro individuo está apuntando con su Kalashnikov que apunta de la parte posteriora del carro derecho al conductor, a partir de cuatro metros lejos.
MANSBRIDGE: ¿Usted sabe tan que a este punto no hay duda qué está sucediendo?
FOWLER: ¿No hay duda qué está sucediendo, y yo pensar - éste es el cliché maldito más grande de toda la hora - cómo puede éste sucederme? Significo que he pasado mucho tiempo en África. Éste es los ocho por ciento seguro del país. Aquí es donde la embajada tiene sus comidas campestres el domingo. ¿Por qué? Esto correcto. ¿Qué está sucediendo? ... Pienso que la cosa llevó a partir 35 a 45 segundos de comenzar el extremo.
MANSBRIDGE: ¿Del principio…?
FOWLER: Tan pronto como realizara de esto no es a, usted sabe, los idiotas en el camino, éste son algo más. A nuestro deber en el otro carro, forzado acostarse debajo de una manta muy smelly, aceitosa con, con estos dos individuos sentándose encima de nosotros, del coche que hace una vuelta y la raya de 180 grados en la otra dirección. Ése era 45 segundos.
¿Como de bien esta cosa fue instalada? Allí hay indicaciones que fue instalado muy bien.
Tengo que admitir, él también fui ejecutado muy eficientemente. La puerta offside posterior estaba abierta rasgado. Louis era clase de rana-marchado detrás del conductor en frente. Ambas [ellos] eran clase de ser lanzado en el coche en frente. Louis era clase de rastrillado a través de su ceja y ojo con el foreside de un AK. Estaba en el otro lado, en el interior. Y preguntado si, podría hacer un funcionamiento para él. ¿Tirarían si hice un funcionamiento para él?
¿Estaría abandonando a Louis y a conductor si? Para el momento en que hubiera articulado las preguntas, estaba en la parte posteriora de ese carro y, e hicimos esta clase de screeching 180 [vuelta del grado]. Y como abajo me forzaban, recuerdo ir ahora la otra manera, mirar y ver nuestro coche allí y estar 100 por ciento de seguro que debe haber uno de sus individuos alrededor a saltar en él y para conducirlo apagado. Un activo muy valioso.
Como ahora sabemos, como descubrí solamente cuando salí, a la izquierda el coche allí, siete horas en el camino, con tres de sus cuatro puertas se abren, el funcionamiento del motor y el intermitente encendido.
MANSBRIDGE: Una de las preguntas de las cuales la clase ha regañado alguno sobre el momento de la captura es porqué había justo usted, Louis Guay y el conductor en el vehículo - y porqué no había una cierta protección.
FOWLER: La derecha, sí.
MANSBRIDGE: Usted ha estado alrededor y usted ha estado en los niveles mayores de la burocracia y con la O.N.U. Usted ha tenido obviamente entrenamiento en estas cosas. Aprecio que esta área particular algo fuera considerada caja fuerte, pero usted habría sido una blanco del perfil. ¿Por qué había ninguna seguridad?
FOWLER: Apesadumbrado. No era - no era considerado algo seguro, él era seguro. Era…
MANSBRIDGE: Pero no era.
FOWLER: Mana no, él no era. Y déjenos consiguen a eso.
Pero la embajada canadiense había estado merendando en el campo allí la semana antes. El gobierno entero iba encima de ese camino en dos días. Había postes del policía a lo largo del camino y estaba en los ocho por ciento del país que era verde en el mapa de la seguridad de la O.N.U.
He estado en circunstancias menos seguras sin la protección. El reparto con la O.N.U, y realmente con los países también, es usted seguridad de la licencia al país de anfitrión. Y la manera que haríamos el itinerario es que enviamos eso a la oficina de la O.N.U en la cual dijimos aquí somos las cosas deseamos hacer y, sobre el fin de semana, deseamos salir en el campo un poco y deseamos ir a esta mina.
[Nosotros] a condición de que a las oficinas de la O.N.U, la O.N.U entonces proporciona eso al gobierno, y la - conjeturo debido a la especulación, usted hablé de ella. Comprobé cuando conseguí detrás y conseguí los email de la oficina de la O.N.U que me decía sí, más lejos a su pregunta, puedo confirmar que hemos pasado su itinerario a toda la gente apropiada. Tan no hay duda que tenían.
No sé si esto correcto, Peter, sino que pienso que soy probablemente la criatura más mayor de la O.N.U a que han agarrado.
MANSBRIDGE: Pero la edición se convierte: Si supieran quién asían, encontrarían exactamente donde usted está.
FOWLER: Exactamente.
MANSBRIDGE: Y la otra gente que sabe eso es todos - los muchos de gente, conjeturo, en el final del día - que consiguió la O.N.U itineraria.
FOWLER: Usted lo consiguió.
MANSBRIDGE: Y usted tiene un gobierno que no tuvo gusto probablemente demasiado de la idea entera de porqué usted estaba allí en el primer lugar.
FOWLER: Odiaron mi misión.
MANSBRIDGE: Porque podría solamente ser un coste a ellos a largo plazo. Cualquier reparto sería un coste a ellos.
FOWLER: Sí. El presidente de Niger, que nombre es Tanja. Estaba claro de la primera vez que lo satisfice en agosto que el hecho lo ofendió, molestado, desconcertado que el secretario general de la O.N.U había visto ajuste para designar un enviado especial para su país. De hecho, algo de la materia que he leído desde que salí, con el spokespeople del gobierno de Niger hablando de mi misión. Dijeron que estaba allí ver si podría conseguir el asimiento de brazos ilícitos que traficaba, que no era mi misión.
Mi misión era conseguir el gobierno para hacer las paces con los rebeldes. ¿Mientras no hubiera paz con los rebeldes, el enemigo estaba en la puerta, la derecha? Si el al-Qaeda está tomando a gente en las cercanías de la ciudad, el enemigo realmente en la puerta. ¿Y gobierno de las marcas sentido, la derecha de la seguridad nacional?
No sé tan quién hizo compras yo. Sé que hizo compras alguien yo. ¿Quién podía él ser? Podía ser el gobierno de Niger. Podría ser un simpatizante del al-Qaeda en la oficina de la O.N.U en Niger. En la oficina de la O.N.U en África del oeste. En el edificio de la secretaría en Nueva York. Todos tenían mi agenda, mi itinerario.
MANSBRIDGE: ¿Usted tiene su pasaporte con usted?
FOWLER: No, no tenía nada, que los condujo locos. Los condujo absolutamente locos. Un individuo me dio infierno. Significo que es irresponsable salir sin sus documentos. ¿Quién usted le piensa es?
MANSBRIDGE: ¿Usted les dijo que usted era?
FOWLER: Sí, inmediatamente les dije que que era, y no eran…
MANSBRIDGE: ¿Y por qué usted había?
FOWLER: No, no conseguimos en cualquiera de eso.
MANSBRIDGE: No, pero yo significa cuando usted dijo que “soy Roberto Fowler, yo soy el representante especial de la O.N.U. ¿”?
FOWLER: Sí.
MANSBRIDGE: ¿Usted dijo eso?
FOWLER: Dije eso. Me preguntaron que que era y dije eso. Y eran - eran unsurprised por ése. Y entonces Louis tenía su passer del laissez de la O.N.U con él, que es el pasaporte de la O.N.U, y mi passer del laissez y mi pasaporte canadiense se sentaban en mi caja fuerte del hotel.
Tomaron el reloj y su materia de Louis en su bolsillo. Por alguna razón no tomaron mi reloj que viajaba barato. Hecho para los asaltantes.
MANSBRIDGE: Podían decir un knockoff.
FOWLER: Sí, eso correcto, exactamente…. Hacen tan esto y son clase de moler alrededor de un pedacito. Y tengo un momento, apenas un momento, y dije a Louis, les digo la verdad. No importa qué sucede, dígales la verdad. Usted no tiene cualquier cosa que sea tan importante proteger que vale su vida.
MANSBRIDGE: ¿Ahora porqué usted dijo eso?
FOWLER: Porque dije si usted comienza a decir mentiras, usted conseguirá cogido para arriba en sus propias telas y usted perderá cualquier capacidad. No dije todo el eso. Eso es cuál estaba en mi mente.
MANSBRIDGE: ¿Pero usted decía que porque ése es Bob Fowler que piensa o usted decía que porque ése es el entrenamiento usted consigue?
FOWLER: No, de que es yo que piensa.
MANSBRIDGE: Porque usted debe haber tenido entrenamiento.
FOWLER: Nadie me entrenó siempre en ser un rehén.
MANSBRIDGE: ¿Realmente?
FOWLER: No.
MANSBRIDGE: ¿Los niveles del mayor que usted estaba en nunca tenido cualquier entrenamiento como eso?
FOWLER: No, nunca. Pero ésa era libros del espía de la lectura y películas que miraban. Y quizá buen sentido.
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FOWLER: En alguna parte muy tarde, significo cuatro o cinco de la mañana, nosotros, nosotros paré. Una manta se lanza en la tierra y nos dicen que el “resto,” y el conductor sale de su coche, se arrastra debajo del carro al resto. Uno de los soldados se reclina, y el otro es el centinela en protector, y él está haciendo té.
Las noticias de CBC han obtenido este cuadro del cellphone. Esto es la primera vez que una imagen de Roberto Fowler en cautiverio se ha hecho público. No puedo acostarme en la manta porque mi parte posteriora lastima demasiado. ¿Y entonces camino hacia este individuo y él se ha agachado sobre este fuego minúsculo, haciendo su té y lo mira para arriba y dice, usted ha calculado hacia fuera quiénes somos todavía? ¿E I muy tentativo y sin la convicción en dicho todo bien, significo soy usted el MNJ? ¿Y él me da una mirada desdeñosa y me dice, en efecto, significa qué I estaría haciendo colgar alrededor con esos pavos, usted sabe? Soy Senegalese. No tengo nada hacer con la política de Niger.
Él no dijo todo el eso, él acaba de decir que “soy Senegalese”. Y dije el “oh”. Y entonces él dice: 'Somos al-Qaeda. Y el fondo de mi mundo cayó hacia fuera. ¿'
Y… soy un individuo que es constantemente clase de funcionar estadística estúpida en su mente, usted sé? ¿Significo que cambio de la luz antes de que cuente a 10? Y cuáles son las probabilidades mi que hacen algo antes de que la primera nieve vuele o usted sabe, esa clase de cosa.
Cuáles son las probabilidades yo va tan a salir de este vivo estaba obviamente grande. Y en ese punto, figura cinco por ciento porque es más bajo presionaba también. Pero “somos al-Qaeda”, y allí entonces, Peter, comienza todos sus cálculos anterior.
¿Son tan al-Qaeda, y cuál es la O.N.U que va a hacer en relación al al-Qaeda? ¿Qué el gobierno de Canadá va a hacer en relación al al-Qaeda? ¿Qué el oeste va a hacer?
MANSBRIDGE: ¿Le desearon porque usted era la O.N.U o porque usted era canadiense?
FOWLER: LA O.N.U.
MANSBRIDGE: ¿La edición canadiense subió en todos?
FOWLER: No, pienso que era una prima agregada para ellos. Pero ellos - pero pienso que este todo va de nuevo a su misión y si o no éramos una blanco de la oportunidad o una misión apuntada. Era tan un individuo grande de la O.N.U es cuál, es lo que él asió.
¿Después de que “nosotros sean al-Qaeda”, y nosotros son viajando cada vez más - siempre fomentan hacia el norte, y ningún duda la sensación bajo, dañado y no muy valeroso, yo pidió el conductor, es su intención ejecutarnos?
No sé porqué pedí eso. No soy seguro yo realmente deseé la respuesta. Pero sin embargo. But he reacted with very satisfying anger, sort of saying 'nah'. I mean, he said: 'Listen, my mission was to capture you. If my mission had been to execute you, you'd be dead. So don't give me any more of that crap.' I mean that was the idea, which again I found a rather happy response.
MANSBRIDGE: You believed him?
FOWLER: Oh boy, that's a big question then and at any future point. I certainly wanted to believe him, so that would do for a while. Yeah.
MANSBRIDGE VOICE-OVER: The chaotic first days stretched into weeks. After 56 hours of brutal off-road driving, a trip that fractured one of Fowler's vertebrae, the hostages were shuffled from camp to camp in northern Mali. All the while, he was held at gunpoint by 20 insurgents, one as young as seven.
Camp life became routine. Fowler wore out his shoes through daily exercise, repairing them with thorns. And he secretly kept track of days by marking his leather belt.
MANSBRIDGE: Tell me about movie night.
FOWLER: As night falls they take three spare tires and pile them one on top of the other, haul out their nifty laptop, plug it into the engine, to the cigarette lighter in the engine compartment, and fire it up and we watch what we call TV night. They would have [a video view] of sniper rifles as they sort of popped the heads off GIs in Iraq and Afghanistan, endless IEDs [improvised explosive devices] blowing up Humvees, trucks and convoys in Iraq and Afghanistan. Lots of suicide bombers crashing through gates blowing up, some buildings … and every time this would happen the audience would scream and wasn't that great.
MANSBRIDGE: Every time there was a TV night they'd play the same?
FOWLER: Oh no, sometimes they had new [movies]. Al-Qaeda central would send them a new hot DVD. Actually the only time I saw real excitement was a guy running in from with a new DVD. Boy, you know we have a bestseller tonight. And they would, it was clearly these were propaganda films, rather good production values. I mean they were well made. It was to pump up the boys. I mean to remind them of what it was all about, and they were Mujahadeen and death in the calls is what it's all about and we will prevail. I eventually refused to go to TV night, but created a bit of an issue, but not a huge issue, a bit of an issue. I said I had seen the twin towers come down 400 times. I don't need to see them again.
MANSBRIDGE: Now you became featured in videos yourself?
FOWLER: Yes.
MANSBRIDGE: There were three in total?
FOWLER: Four actually.
MANSBRIDGE: Four. And now the idea initially was 'proof of life' videos?
FOWLER: Yes that's certainly what I thought. They're not all the same. But the first one we did on Day 5. We were ushered into a tent. The only time we were ever in a tent was to make videos. I didn't like tents. Every time I walked into a tent I remembered Daniel Pearl and it wasn't a good memory.
Each one was different, very different. The first one was what I kind of expected to be; it was proof of life. I'd seen the movies. I knew that that's what had to happen and I knew that that meant my family would know that I was captured and they were not going to be real happy about the al-Qaeda part of it.
I think I was suggesting to you they're not technically incompetent. I mean just a total contradiction of these guys festooned with sat phones, cell phones, GPSs, walkie-talkies, video cameras and laptops — whose minds are 15 centuries away, whose weapons are a couple of generations old, and who really wish they didn't have rifles and could get back to the days of the scimitar and saber. Strange contradictions.
Video three was very different. Somber. No backdrop when we got in there. Hands behind our back. Blindfolded for the first time. And we're told 'don't speak'. You have no speaking role. Don't speak.
And all I know of that video was I guy intoning behind me a long screed in Arabic with lots of references to al-Qaeda, Jihad, Muhjahadeen, Allah and Allahu Akhbar and blindfolds came off, we were taken out of the tent, taken back to our tree and left alone, absolutely alone. Nobody talked to us, nobody came near us.
And I did not feel happy about that. I didn't know what had happened. I guessed — and does it happen I think I guessed absolutely accurately — it was a death threat, an ultimatum.
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Robert Fowler rapito
Automatically translated into Italian thanks to WorldLingo
Trascrizione ESCLUSIVA di NOTIZIE
di CBC: Il diplomatico canadese di intervista
del Robert Fowler parla con Peter Mansbridge del suo ultimo di prova ardua
di abduzione aggiornato: Martedì 8 settembre 2009 | 10:57 PM ET le notizie Robert
Fowler di Comments0Recommend6CBC parla di come è stato bloccato, di che cosa è accaduto lui nella prigionia e come lui eventualy è stato liberato in un'esclusiva di notizie di CBC. (Notizie del Tom Sharina/CBC) questa è la storia del untold del diplomatico canadese Robert Fowler, che, per 130 giorni all'inizio di quest'anno, è stato tenuto al gunpoint e sotto la minaccia costante dell'esecuzione.
Per quei quattro e una metà di mesi era vivente, mangiante, mobile ed addormentato con Al-Qaeda mentre le trattative disperate di dietro--scene hanno avvenuto per provare a liberare lui ed il suo assistente, Louis Guay.
Ciò che segue è una trascrizione dell'intervista del Peter Mansbridge con Fowler, che ha ventilato martedì, settembre. 8, sul cittadino. È una parte interna d'arresto di sguardo un il kidnapping dall'organizzazione del terrorista temuta del mondo.
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MANSBRIDGE: Bene, è stato una coppia dei mesi ora da quando la prova ardua si è conclusa. Come siete?
FOWLER: Penso buon grazioso. Ho sentito appena ieri una storia dal NU di un tipo che è stato occorr tempo quasi uguale mentre eravamo nel Pakistan e Baluchistan. Ha pensato che fosse buono grazioso e cinque mesi più successivamente, senza alcun avviso, è caduto nelle parti. Così devo dargli una risposta piuttosto immediata e provvisoria: finora, così buon.
MANSBRIDGE: voi però, benchè, hanno momenti giornalieri, ogni coppia dei giorni, dove voi pensano esso unprompted? Cioè nessuno gli chiede che, cominci appena improvvisamente pensare a questo proposito?
FOWLER: . E tutti i generi di innesco di cose esso. , Forse il momento più sconosciuto ed io stava comunicando con mio pal, Louis Guay, che era in questo con me, l'altro giorno ed entrambi abbiamo esattamente la stessa reazione. È, esso è irreale. Significo esso sono accaduto? Era realmente come quello? O sono, l'I immaginante alcuno del roba? Ed allora improvvisamente, otterrete un'altra memoria che gli ricorderà che era esattamente come quella.
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MANSBRIDGE VOICE-OVER: Bob Fowler era diplomatico canadese ordinario. Per le decadi era sul bordo principale delle iniziative straniere di questo paese. Regolarmente alla mano destra dei ministri principali, aveva lavorato il suo senso verso l'alto tramite i percorsi spesso perfidi della burocrazia di Ottawa. I suoi sostenitori lo hanno elogiato per il suoi intellect e pietà. I suoi nemici hanno visto lui come testardo ed il controllo. Allora, in 2006, a 62, è andato in pensione con honour ed i accolades.
Ma “la pensione„ non era realmente nel vocabolario del Bob Fowler. L'Africa era. Ed era al continente - una passione carriera-lunga per Fowler che le Nazioni Unite gli hanno chiesto di andare. Risorse minerarie dell'eccedenza nasty di disputa fra il governo del Niger ed il movimento ribelle MNJ come la missione. L'individuazione della pace era la sfida.
Ma preferibilmente, su un pomeriggio pigro di domenica appena prima Natale, lungo l'unica strada principale pavimentata del Niger, appena 30 minuti fuori del capitale, mondo del Bob Fowler si sono trasformati in un incubo.
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FOWLER: Ci è improvvisamente un camion che li passa. Stiamo andando realmente veloci e sta andando più velocemente e non è un Lamborghini, lui è un camion. Che cosa è errato con questa immagine, sapete?
MANSBRIDGE: Avete saputo che ci era male qualcosa con l'immagine?
FOWLER: No, non ancora. No, tranne - buono mi ricordo di - va vicino ed immediatamente fette attraverso la strada, destra davanti noi. Significo il whoa, io significo realmente pericoloso, spaventoso ed il nostro driver ed immediatamente oscillo fuori per passarlo, il punto in cui oscilla ancora fuori. Allora ho saputo che eravamo nella difficoltà.
Prima che proprio ci arrestiamo… i due tipi, facce africane, nella parte posteriore del camioncino scoperto vaulting sopra il bordo. Un tipo vaulting sopra il bordo con il suo Kalashnikov su e l'altro tipo sta mirando con il suo Kalashnikov che mira dalla parte posteriore del camion diritto al driver, da quattro tester via.
MANSBRIDGE: Così sapete che a questo punto ci è senza dubbio che cosa sta accadendo?
FOWLER: Ci è senza dubbio che cosa sta accadendo ed io pensare - questo è il cliché maledetto più grande di tutto il tempo - come può questo accadere me? Significo che ho speso molto tempo in Africa. Ciò è gli otto per cento sicuro del paese. Ciò è dove l'ambasciata ha loro picnic la domenica. Perchè? Ciò non è di destra. Che cosa sta accadendo? ... Penso che la cosa abbia occorr 35 - 45 secondi dall'inizio alla fine.
MANSBRIDGE: Dall'inizio…?
FOWLER: Non appena ho realizzato da questa non proviene la a, voi sa, i idiots sulla strada, questa è qualcos'altro. A nostro dovere nell'altro camion, forzato trovarsi giù sotto una coperta molto smelly e oleosa con, con questi due tipi che si siedono in cima noi, all'automobile che fa una girata e una striatura da 180 gradi nell'altro senso. Quello era di 45 secondi.
Come questa cosa è stata installata? Ci là sono indicazioni che sono stati installati molto bene.
Devo ammettere, esso inoltre molto efficientemente sono stato eseguito. Il portello offside posteriore era aperto strappato. Louis stava essendo specie del rana-marciato di dietro il driver nella parte anteriore. Entrambe [loro] erano specie di essere gettato nell'automobile nella parte anteriore. Louis era specie del rastrellato di attraverso il suoi sopracciglio ed occhio con il foreside di un AK. Ero dall'altro lato, sulla parte interna. E domandato se, potrebbe fargli un funzionamento per. Sparerebbero se gli facessi un funzionamento per?
Stavo abbandonando Louis ed il driver se? Per il momento in cui articoli le domande, ero nella parte posteriore di quel camion ed ed abbiamo fatto questa specie di screeching 180 [girata di grado]. E poichè stavo forzando giù, mi ricordo di andare ora l'altro senso, osservare e vedere il nostro automobile là ed essere 100 per cento sicuri che ci dovrebbe essere uno dei loro tipi circa per saltare in esso e per allontanarli. Un bene molto importante.
Come ora sappiamo, come ho scoperto soltanto quando ho uscito, a sinistra l'automobile là, sette ore sulla strada, con tre dei relativi quattro portelli si aprono, il funzionamento del motore ed il lampeggiatore sopra.
MANSBRIDGE: Una delle domande di che la specie nagged alcuno circa il momento del bloccaggio è perchè ci era giusto voi, Louis Guay ed il driver nel veicolo - e perchè ci non era una certa protezione.
FOWLER: Destra, yeah.
MANSBRIDGE: Siete stati intorno e siete stati nei livelli maggiori della burocrazia e con il NU. Avete avuti ovviamente addestramento su queste cose. Apprezzo che questa zona particolare piuttosto è stata considerata cassaforte, ma sareste stati un obiettivo di profilo. Perchè era ci nessuna sicurezza?
FOWLER: Spiacente. Non era - non è stato considerato in qualche modo sicuro, esso era sicuro. Era…
MANSBRIDGE: Ma non era.
FOWLER: Scaturisce no, esso non era. Ed otteniamo a quello.
Ma l'ambasciata canadese stava facendo un picnic prima là la settimana. L'intero governo stava andando su quella strada in due giorni. Ci erano alberini della polizia lungo la strada ed era negli otto per cento del paese che era verde sul programma di sicurezza di NU.
Sono stato nelle circostanze meno sicuri senza protezione. L'affare con il NU e realmente con i paesi pure, è voi sicurezza di permesso al p#se ospitante. Ed il senso che faremmo l'itinerario è che trasmettiamo quello all'ufficio di NU in cui abbiamo detto qui siamo le cose desideriamo fare e, sopra la fine settimana, desideriamo uscire nella campagna una punta piccola e desideriamo andare a questa miniera.
[Noi] a condizione che agli uffici di NU, il NU allora li fornisce quello al governo e - indovino a causa della speculazione, voi la ho parlata. Ho controllato quando ho ottenuto indietro ed ho ottenuto i email dall'ufficio di NU che lo dico sì, più ulteriormente alla vostra domanda, posso confermare che abbiamo passato il vostro itinerario a tutta la gente adatta. Così ci è senza dubbio che hanno avuti.
Non so se questo è di destra, Peter, ma penso che sia probabilmente la creatura di NU maggiore che hanno grippato.
MANSBRIDGE: Ma l'edizione diventa: Se conoscessero chi stavano afferrando, troverebbero esattamente dove siete.
FOWLER: Esattamente.
MANSBRIDGE: E l'altra gente che conosce quella è ognuno - gente molto, indovino, alla conclusione del giorno - che ha ottenuto l'itinerario di NU.
FOWLER: Lo avete ottenuto.
MANSBRIDGE: Ed avete ottenuto un governo che probabilmente non ha gradito troppo l'idea intera di perchè eravate là in primo luogo.
FOWLER: Odiavano la mia missione.
MANSBRIDGE: Poiché potrebbe soltanto essere un costo a loro a lungo termine. Tutto l'affare sarebbe un costo a loro.
FOWLER: Yeah. Il presidente del Niger, di cui il nome è Tanja. Era chiaro da la prima volta lo ho venuto a contatto di in agosto che è stato offenduto, infastidito, confuso dal fatto che il segretario generale del NU aveva visto la misura per nominare un inviato speciale per il suo paese. Infatti, alcuno del roba che ho letto da quando ho uscito, con lo spokespeople di governo del Niger che parla della mia missione. Hanno detto che ero là vedere se potessi ottenere le armi illecite che traffico, che non erano la mia missione.
La mia missione era di convincere il governo per fare la pace con i ribelli. Finchè non ci era pace con i ribelli, il nemico era al cancello, destra? Se Al-Qaeda sta prendendo la gente sui outskirts della città, il nemico realmente al cancello. E controllo delle marche senso, destra di sicurezza nazionale?
Così non conosco chi ha acquistato me. So che qualcuno ha acquistato me. Chi ha potuto esso essere? Ha potuto essere il governo del Niger. Potrebbe essere un simpatizzante di Al-Qaeda nell'ufficio di NU nel Niger. Nell'ufficio di NU in Africa ad ovest. Nella costruzione del segretariato a New York. Tutti hanno avuti mio ordine del giorno, il mio itinerario.
MANSBRIDGE: Gli avete vostro passaporto con?
FOWLER: No, non ho avuto niente, che li guidasse pazzeschi. Li ha guidati assolutamente pazzeschi. Un tipo mi ha dato l'inferno. Significo che è irresponsabile uscire senza vostri documenti. Chi li pensate siete?
MANSBRIDGE: Avete detto loro che eravate?
FOWLER: Sì, immediatamente ho detto loro che che ero e non erano…
MANSBRIDGE: E perchè voi era ci?
FOWLER: No, non siamo entrato in c'è ne di quello.
MANSBRIDGE: No, ma io significa quando avete detto che “sono Robert Fowler, io sono il rappresentante speciale di NU. „?
FOWLER: Sì.
MANSBRIDGE: Avete detto quello?
FOWLER: Ho detto quello. Mi hanno chiesto che che ero ed ho detto quello. Ed erano - erano unsurprised da quello. Ed allora Louis gli ha avuto suo passer del laissez di NU con, che è il passaporto di NU ed il mio passer del laissez ed il mio passaporto canadese stavano sedendo in mia cassaforte dell'hotel.
Hanno preso la vigilanza ed il suo roba del Louis in sua tasca. Per qualche motivo non hanno preso la mia vigilanza mobile economica. Diretto verso i muggers.
MANSBRIDGE: Hanno potuto dire ad un knockoff.
FOWLER: Yeah, quello è di destra, esattamente…. Così fanno questo e sono genere di macinazione intorno ad una punta. Ed ho un momento, appena un momento ed ho detto Louis, dico loro la verità. Qualunque cosa accada, dica loro la verità. Non avete nulla che sia così importante da proteggere che vale la vostra vita.
MANSBRIDGE: Ora perchè avete detto quello?
FOWLER: Poiché ho detto se cominciate dire alle bugie, otterrete aggiornati nei vostri propri fotoricettori e perderete tutta l'abilità. Non ho detto tutto quello. Quello è che cosa era nella mia mente.
MANSBRIDGE: Ma stavate dicendo che perché quello è Bob Fowler che pensa o stavate dicendo che perché quello è l'addestramento ottenete?
FOWLER: No, quello è me che penso.
MANSBRIDGE: Poiché dovete avere addestramento.
FOWLER: Nessuno lo ha addestrato mai in essere un ostaggio.
MANSBRIDGE: Realmente?
FOWLER: No.
MANSBRIDGE: I livelli dell'anziano che eravate mai all'non avuto a tutto l'addestramento come quello?
FOWLER: No, mai. Ma quello era libri della spia della lettura e film guardanti. E forse buon senso.
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FOWLER: In qualche luogo molto in ritardo, significo quattro o cinque di mattina, noi, noi mi sono arrestato. Una coperta è gettata sulla terra e ci diciamo a che “il resto,„ ed il driver esca del suo automobile, strisci sotto il camion a resto. Uno dei soldati si riposa ed altro quello è il sentry sulla protezione e sta facendo il tè.
Le notizie di CBC hanno ottenuto questa immagine di cellphone. Ciò è la prima volta un'immagine di Robert Fowler nella prigionia è stata resa a pubblico. Non posso trovarmi giù sulla coperta perché la mia parte posteriore danneggia troppo. Ed allora cammino verso questo tipo e crouched sopra questo fuoco molto piccolo, facendolo il suoi tè ed osservate in su e dite, ha calcolato fuori chi siamo ancora? Ed I molto a titolo di prova e senza la convinzione affatto detto bene, significo sono voi il MNJ? E mi dà uno sguardo disdainful e lo dice, in effetti, significa che cosa I stava facendo appendere intorno con quei tacchini, voi sa? Sono Senegalese. Ho niente a che fare con la politica del Niger.
Non ha detto tutto quello, ha detto appena che “sono Senegalese„. Ed ho detto “l'OH„. Ed allora dice: 'Siamo Al-Qaeda. E la parte inferiore del mio mondo ha caduto da. '
E… sono un tipo che è costantemente specie di funzionamento delle statistiche stupide nella sua mente, voi so? Significo che cambiamento della luce prima che conti a 10? E che cosa sono le probabilità della mia che fanno qualcosa prima che la prima neve voli o sappiate, quella specie della cosa.
Così che cosa sono le probabilità io sto andando uscire da questo vivo era ovviamente grande. Ed a quel punto, ho calcolato cinque per cento perché più basso ugualmente stava deprimendo. Ma “siamo Al-Qaeda„ e là allora, Peter, comincia più presto tutti i vostri calcoli.
Così sono Al-Qaeda e che cosa il NU sta andando fare di fronte ad Al-Qaeda? Che cosa il governo del Canada sta andando fare di fronte ad Al-Qaeda? Che cosa l'ovest sta andando fare?
MANSBRIDGE: Li hanno desiderati perché eravate NU o perché eravate canadesi?
FOWLER: NU.
MANSBRIDGE: L'edizione canadese è venuto in su affatto?
FOWLER: No, penso che sia stato un'indennità aggiunta per loro. Ma - ma penso che questo tutto vada di nuovo alla loro missione e se o non eravamo un obiettivo dell'occasione o una missione designata. Così era un tipo grande di NU è che cosa, è che cosa hanno afferrato.
Dopo che “noi siano Al-Qaeda„ e noi sono viaggiando sempre più - mai avanzano verso il nord e senza dubbio ritenere basso, danneggiato e non molto coraggioso, io ha chiesto il driver, è la vostra intenzione eseguirli?
Non so perchè ho chiesto quello. Non sono sicuro io realmente ho desiderato la risposta. Ma tuttavia. But he reacted with very satisfying anger, sort of saying 'nah'. I mean, he said: 'Listen, my mission was to capture you. If my mission had been to execute you, you'd be dead. So don't give me any more of that crap.' I mean that was the idea, which again I found a rather happy response.
MANSBRIDGE: You believed him?
FOWLER: Oh boy, that's a big question then and at any future point. I certainly wanted to believe him, so that would do for a while. Yeah.
MANSBRIDGE VOICE-OVER: The chaotic first days stretched into weeks. After 56 hours of brutal off-road driving, a trip that fractured one of Fowler's vertebrae, the hostages were shuffled from camp to camp in northern Mali. All the while, he was held at gunpoint by 20 insurgents, one as young as seven.
Camp life became routine. Fowler wore out his shoes through daily exercise, repairing them with thorns. And he secretly kept track of days by marking his leather belt.
MANSBRIDGE: Tell me about movie night.
FOWLER: As night falls they take three spare tires and pile them one on top of the other, haul out their nifty laptop, plug it into the engine, to the cigarette lighter in the engine compartment, and fire it up and we watch what we call TV night. They would have [a video view] of sniper rifles as they sort of popped the heads off GIs in Iraq and Afghanistan, endless IEDs [improvised explosive devices] blowing up Humvees, trucks and convoys in Iraq and Afghanistan. Lots of suicide bombers crashing through gates blowing up, some buildings … and every time this would happen the audience would scream and wasn't that great.
MANSBRIDGE: Every time there was a TV night they'd play the same?
FOWLER: Oh no, sometimes they had new [movies]. Al-Qaeda central would send them a new hot DVD. Actually the only time I saw real excitement was a guy running in from with a new DVD. Boy, you know we have a bestseller tonight. And they would, it was clearly these were propaganda films, rather good production values. I mean they were well made. It was to pump up the boys. I mean to remind them of what it was all about, and they were Mujahadeen and death in the calls is what it's all about and we will prevail. I eventually refused to go to TV night, but created a bit of an issue, but not a huge issue, a bit of an issue. I said I had seen the twin towers come down 400 times. I don't need to see them again.
MANSBRIDGE: Now you became featured in videos yourself?
FOWLER: Yes.
MANSBRIDGE: There were three in total?
FOWLER: Four actually.
MANSBRIDGE: Four. And now the idea initially was 'proof of life' videos?
FOWLER: Yes that's certainly what I thought. They're not all the same. But the first one we did on Day 5. We were ushered into a tent. The only time we were ever in a tent was to make videos. I didn't like tents. Every time I walked into a tent I remembered Daniel Pearl and it wasn't a good memory.
Each one was different, very different. The first one was what I kind of expected to be; it was proof of life. I'd seen the movies. I knew that that's what had to happen and I knew that that meant my family would know that I was captured and they were not going to be real happy about the al-Qaeda part of it.
I think I was suggesting to you they're not technically incompetent. I mean just a total contradiction of these guys festooned with sat phones, cell phones, GPSs, walkie-talkies, video cameras and laptops — whose minds are 15 centuries away, whose weapons are a couple of generations old, and who really wish they didn't have rifles and could get back to the days of the scimitar and saber. Strange contradictions.
Video three was very different. Somber. No backdrop when we got in there. Hands behind our back. Blindfolded for the first time. And we're told 'don't speak'. You have no speaking role. Don't speak.
And all I know of that video was I guy intoning behind me a long screed in Arabic with lots of references to al-Qaeda, Jihad, Muhjahadeen, Allah and Allahu Akhbar and blindfolds came off, we were taken out of the tent, taken back to our tree and left alone, absolutely alone. Nobody talked to us, nobody came near us.
And I did not feel happy about that. I didn't know what had happened. I guessed — and does it happen I think I guessed absolutely accurately — it was a death threat, an ultimatum.
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Robert Fowler entführt
Automatically translated into German thanks to WorldLingo
CBC NACHRICHTEN EXKLUSIVE
Abschrift: Robert Fowler kanadischer
Diplomat des Interviews spricht mit Peter Mansbridge über seine Abduktion Zerreißprobe
letzter Update: Dienstag, den 8. September 2009 | 10:57 P.M. UND Comments0Recommend6CBC Nachrichten
Robert Fowler sprechen, wie er gefangengenommen wurde, über was ihm in der Gefangenschaft geschahen und wie er eventualy in einem CBC Nachrichten Exklusiven freigegeben wurde. (Tom Sharina/CBC Nachrichten) ist dieses die untold Geschichte des kanadischen Diplomaten Robert Fowler, der, für 130 Tage früh dieses Jahr, an der Waffengewalt und unter konstanter Drohung der Durchführung gehalten wurde.
Für jene vier und eine Hälfte Monate war er, schlafend lebend, essend, reisend und mit Al-Qaeda, während hoffnungslose Hinter-dszenen Vermittlungen stattfanden, um zu versuchen, ihn und seinen Assistenten freizugeben, Louis Guay.
Das folgende ist eine Abschrift Peter Mansbridges des Interviews mit Fowler, der Dienstag lüftete, Sept. 8, auf dem Staatsangehörigen. Es ist ein Herz-stoppendes Blickinnere ein Entführung durch die gefürchtete Terroristorganisation der Welt.
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MANSBRIDGE: Gut ist es ein Paar von Monaten jetzt gewesen, seit die Zerreißprobe beendete. Wie geht es Ihnen?
FOWLER: Ich denke hübsches gutes. Ich hörte gerade eine Geschichte gestern von der UNO eines Kerls, dem ungefähr gleiche Zeit gedauert wurde, während wir in Pakistan und in Baluchistan waren. Er dachte, daß er hübsches gutes war und fünf Monate später, ohne irgendeine Nachricht, in Stücke fielen. So muß ich Ihnen eine ziemlich sofortige und temporäre Antwort geben: bis jetzt so gut.
MANSBRIDGE: Sie jedoch, obwohl, haben die täglichen Momente, jedes Paar von Tagen, wo Sie denken an es unprompted? Das heißt, fragt niemand Sie daß, Sie gerade plötzlich anfangen, an es zu denken?
FOWLER: Ich. Und alle Arten Sacheauslöser es. , Möglicherweise der merkwürdigste Moment und ich sprach mit meinem Kameraden, Louis Guay, der diesbezüglich mit mir war, der andere Tag und wir beide haben genau die gleiche Reaktion. Es ist, es ist unwirklich. Ich bedeute es geschah? War es wirklich wie das? Oder bin ich, morgens I etwas von dem Material vorstellend? Und dann plötzlich, erhalten Sie ein anderes Gedächtnis, das Sie erinnert, daß es genau wie das war.
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MANSBRIDGE VOICE-OVER: Bob Fowler war kein gewöhnlicher kanadischer Diplomat. Für Dekaden war er auf dem führenden Rand der fremden Initiativen dieses Landes. Regelmäßig an der rechten Hand der Premierminister, hatte er seine Weise aufwärts durch die häufig gefährlichen Wege der Ottawa Bürokratie bearbeitet. Seine Verfechter priesen ihn für seinen Intellekt und Mitleid. Seine Feinde sahen ihn, wie störrisch und das Steuern. Dann 2006, bei 62, zog sich er mit Ehre und Ritterschlägen zurück.
Aber „Ruhestand“ war nicht wirklich Bob Fowlers im Wortschatz. Afrika war. Und es war zum Kontinent - eine Karriere-lange Neigung für Fowler - den die Nationen ihn baten, zu gehen. Mineralbetriebsmittel eines bösen Debatteüberschusses zwischen der Regierung von Niger und der rebellischen Bewegung MNJ als der Mission. Frieden zu finden war die Herausforderung.
Aber anstatt, an einem faulen Sonntag Nachmittag kurz vor Weihnachten, entlang Nigers einziger gepflasterter Landstraße, machten gerade 30 Minuten außerhalb des Kapitals, Bob Fowlers Welt zu einen Alptraum.
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FOWLER: Plötzlich gibt es einen LKW, der uns führt. Wir gehen wirklich schnell und er geht schneller, und er ist nicht ein Lamborghini, er ist ein LKW. Was ist mit dieser Abbildung falsch, wissen Sie?
MANSBRIDGE: Sie wußten, daß es etwas falsch mit der Abbildung gab?
FOWLER: Nr., nicht schon. Nr., ausgenommen - wohl erinnere mich ich - ihn geht vorbei und sofort Scheiben über der Straße, Recht vor uns. Ich bedeute whoa, ich bedeute wirklich gefährliches, furchtsam und unseren Treiber und schwinge sofort heraus, um ihn zu führen, an dessen Punkt er heraus wieder schwingt. Dann wußte ich, daß wir in der Mühe waren.
Bevor wir hatten durchaus gestoppt… die zwei Kerle, afrikanische Gesichter, in der Rückseite des Aufnahme LKW vaulting über dem Rand. Ein Kerl vaulting über dem Rand mit seinem Kalashnikov stark und der andere Kerl zielt mit seinem Kalashnikov, das gerade von der Rückseite des LKW auf den Treiber, von vier Metern entfernt abzielt.
MANSBRIDGE: So wissen Sie an diesem Punkt dort sind kein Zweifel, was geschieht?
FOWLER: Es gibt keinen Zweifel was geschieht, und ich zu denken - dieses ist das größte verfluchte cliché aller Zeit - wie kann dieses mir geschehen? Ich bedeute, daß ich viel Zeit in Afrika aufgewendet habe. Dieses ist das sichere acht Prozent des Landes. Dieses ist, wo die Botschaft ihre Picknicks am Sonntag hat. Warum? Dieses ist nicht recht. Was geschieht? ... Ich denke, daß die Sache von 35 bis 45 Sekunden von Anfang bis Ende dauerte.
MANSBRIDGE: Vom Anfang…?
FOWLER: Von, sobald ich verwirklichte, diesem nicht ist a, Sie wissen, ist Idioten auf der Straße, diese noch etwas. Zu unserem Sollen im anderen LKW, Zwangs unter einer sehr smelly, öligen Decke mit unten liegen, wenn diese zwei Kerle auf uns, das Auto sitzen, das eine 180-Gradumdrehung und einen Streifen in der anderen Richtung getan wird. Die war 45 Sekunden.
Wie gut wurde diese Sache aufgestellt? Es dort gibt Anzeigen, die es sehr gut aufgestellt wurde.
Ich muß zulassen, es wurde auch durchgeführt sehr leistungsfähig. Die im Abseits hintere Tür war heftig gezerrissenes geöffnetes. Louis war Art Frosch-marschiert hinter den Treiber in der Frontseite. Beide von [sie] waren Art in das Auto in der Frontseite geworfen werden. Louis war Art geharkt über seiner Augenbraue und Auge mit dem foreside eines AK. Ich war auf der anderen Seite, auf dem Innere. Und gewundert, wenn ich, könnte einen Durchlauf für ihn bilden. Würden sie schießen, wenn ich einen Durchlauf für ihn bildete?
Würde ich Louis und den Treiber verlassen, wenn ich? Bis ich die Fragen artikuliert hatte, war ich in der Rückseite dieses LKW und, und wir taten diese Art von Screeching 180 [Gradumdrehung]. Und da ich unten gezwungen wurde, erinnere mich ich, jetzt zu gehen die andere Weise, unser Auto dort zu schauen und zu sehen und sicher zu sein 100 Prozent, daß es einen ihrer Kerle, ungefähr geben sollte, zum in ihn zu springen und er weg zu fahren. Ein sehr Wertgegenstand.
Wie wir jetzt wissen, wie ich herausfand, nur als ich hinausging, öffnen sich sie nach links das Auto dort, sieben Stunden auf der Straße, mit drei seiner vier Türen, der Triebwerklauf und der Blinker an.
MANSBRIDGE: Eine der Fragen, dessen Art einiges über den Moment der Sicherung nagged, ist, warum es Sie gerecht gab, Louis Guay und der Treiber im Träger - und warum es nicht etwas Schutz gab.
FOWLER: Recht, yeah.
MANSBRIDGE: Sie sind herum gewesen und Sie sind in den älteren Niveaus der Bürokratie und mit der UNO gewesen. Sie haben offensichtlich Training auf diesen Sachen gehabt. Ich schätze, daß diesen bestimmten Bereich ein wenig als Safe galt, aber Sie würden ein Profilziel gewesen sein. Warum gab es keine Sicherheit?
FOWLER: Traurig. Es war nicht - es galt nicht als ein wenig sicher, es war sicher. Es war…
MANSBRIDGE: Aber es war nicht.
FOWLER: Quellen Nr., es war nicht hervor. Und lassen Sie uns an das gelangen.
Aber die kanadische Botschaft picnicking dort die Woche vorher. Die gesamte Regierung ging diese Straße an zwei Tagen hinauf. Es gab Polizeipfosten entlang der Straße und sie war in den acht Prozent des Landes, das auf dem UNO Sicherheit Diagramm grün war.
Ich bin unter weniger sicheren Umständen ohne Schutz gewesen. Das Abkommen mit der UNO und wirklich mit Ländern außerdem, ist Sie Urlaubsicherheit zum Gastland. Und die Weise, die wir den Reiseweg tun würden, ist, daß wir das zum UNO Büro schicken, in dem wir sind hier die Sachen sagten, wir tun möchten und, über dem Wochenende, möchten wir in die Landschaft ein wenig hinausgehen und wir möchten zu dieser Grube gehen.
[Wir] vorausgesetzt daß zu den UNO Büros, stellt die UNO dann die zur Regierung und sie zur Verfügung - ich schätze wegen der Betrachtung, Sie sprach über sie. Ich überprüfte, als ich zurück erhielt und ich die email vom UNO Büro, weiter zu Ihrer Frage, mich ja sagend kann bestätigen erhielt, daß wir allen passenden Leuten Ihren Reiseweg geführt haben. So es gibt keinen Zweifel, den sie hatten.
Ich weiß nicht, wenn dieses recht ist, Peter, aber ich denke, daß ich vermutlich das älterste UNO Geschöpf bin, das sie ergriffen haben.
MANSBRIDGE: Aber die Ausgabe wird: Wenn sie wußten, wem sie ergriffen, würden sie genau finden, wo Sie sind.
FOWLER: Genau.
MANSBRIDGE: Und die anderen Leute, die die wissen, sind jeder - eine Menge Leute, schätze ich, das Ende des Tages - der die UNO Reise erhielt.
FOWLER: Sie erhielten es.
MANSBRIDGE: Und Sie haben eine Regierung, die vermutlich nicht zu viel die vollständige Idee mochte von, warum Sie dort an erster Stelle waren.
FOWLER: Sie haßten meine Mission.
MANSBRIDGE: Weil es Kosten zu ihnen nur langfristig sein könnte. Jedes mögliches Abkommen würde Kosten zu ihnen sein.
FOWLER: Yeah. Der Präsident von Niger, dessen Name Tanja ist. Es war von frei, das erste mal ich ihn im August traf, daß er beleidigt wurde, gestört, in Verlegenheit gebracht durch die Tatsache, die der Generalsekretär der UNO Sitz gesehen hatte, um zu ernennen einen speziellen Abgesandten für sein Land. Tatsächlich etwas von dem Material, das, ich, seit ich hinausging, wenn das Niger Regierung spokespeople über meine Mission spricht gelesen habe. Sie sagten, daß ich dort war, zu sehen, wenn ich unerlaubte Arme erreichen könnte handelnd, das nicht meine Mission war.
Meine Mission war, die Regierung zu erhalten, um Frieden mit den Aufrührern zu bilden. Solange es keinen Frieden mit den Aufrührern gab, war der Feind am Gatter, Recht? Wenn Al-Qaeda Leute auf dem Randgebiet der Stadt nimmt, des Feindes wirklich am Gatter. Und Regierungsgewalt der Staatssicherheit Marken Richtung, Recht?
So weiß ich nicht, wem ich kaufte. Ich weiß, daß jemand ich kaufte. Wer konnte es sein? Es konnte die Regierung von Niger sein. Sein könnte ein Al-Qaeda Gleichgesinnter im UNO Büro in Niger. Im UNO Büro in Westafrika. Im Sekretariatgebäude in New York. Alle hatten meine Tagesordnung, meinen Reiseweg.
MANSBRIDGE: Hatten Sie Ihren Paß mit Ihnen?
FOWLER: Nr., hatte ich nichts, das sie verrückt fuhr. Fuhr sie absolut verrückt. Ein Kerl gab mir Hölle. Ich bedeute, daß es unverantwortlich ist, ohne Ihre Dokumente zu erlöschen. Wem denken Sie Sie sind?
MANSBRIDGE: Erklärten Sie ihnen, die Sie waren?
FOWLER: Ja, sofort erklärte ich ihnen, daß die ich war und sie waren nicht…
MANSBRIDGE: Und warum Sie gab es?
FOWLER: Nr., erhielten wir nicht in irgendwelche von dem.
MANSBRIDGE: Nr., aber ich bedeuten, als Sie sagten, daß „ich Robert Fowler, ich bin der UNO spezielle Repräsentant bin. “?
FOWLER: Ja.
MANSBRIDGE: Sie sagten das?
FOWLER: Ich sagte den. Sie fragten mich, daß der ich war und ich sagte den. Und sie waren - sie waren unsurprised durch die. Und dann hatte Louis seinen UNO laissez Passanten mit ihm, der der UNO Paß ist, und mein laissez Passant und mein kanadischer Paß sassen in meinem Hotelsafe.
Sie nahmen Uhr und sein Material Louiss in seiner Tasche. Sie aus irgendeinem Grund nahmen nicht meine billige reisende Uhr. Gebildet für Muggers.
MANSBRIDGE: Sie konnten ein knockoff erklären.
FOWLER: Yeah ist das recht, genau…. So tun sie dies und sie sind Art des Prägens um eine Spitze. Und ich habe einen Moment, gerade einen Moment, und ich sagte Louis, sage ihnen die Wahrheit. Egal was geschieht, sagen Sie ihnen die Wahrheit. Sie haben nicht nichts, das so wichtig sich zu schützen ist, daß es Ihr Leben ist.
MANSBRIDGE: Jetzt warum sagten Sie das?
FOWLER: Weil ich sagte, wenn Sie anfangen, Lügen zu erklären, erhalten Sie in Ihren eigenen Netzen aufholt und Sie verlieren jede mögliche Fähigkeit. Ich sagte nicht alles den. Das ist, was in meinem Verstand war.
MANSBRIDGE: Aber sagten Sie, daß, weil der Bob denkender Fowler ist oder, Sie sagten, daß, weil das das Training ist, Sie erhalten?
FOWLER: Nr., das ist ich denkend.
MANSBRIDGE: Weil Sie Training gehabt haben müssen.
FOWLER: Niemanden bildete mich überhaupt beim Sein eine Geisel aus.
MANSBRIDGE: Wirklich?
FOWLER: Nein.
MANSBRIDGE: Die älterniveaus, daß Sie an nie gehabt jedem möglichem Training wie das waren?
FOWLER: Nr., nie. Aber der war Lesespionbücher und aufpassende Filme. Und möglicherweise gute Richtung.
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FOWLER: Irgendwo sehr spät, bedeute ich vier oder fünf morgens, wir, wir stoppte. Eine Decke wird aus den Grund geworfen und wir werden erklärt, daß „Rest,“ und der Treiber ein sein Auto, kriecht unter den LKW zum Rest verläßt. Einer der Soldaten steht still, und das andere ist die Wache auf Schutz, und er bildet Tee.
CBC Nachrichten haben diese cellphone Abbildung erhalten. Dieses ist, das erste mal ein Bild von Robert Fowler in der Gefangenschaft öffentlichkeit gebildet worden ist. Ich kann nicht auf der Wolldecke unten liegen, weil meine Rückseite zu viel verletzt. Und ich gehe dann in Richtung zu diesem Kerl und er hat sich über diesem kleinen Feuer, seinen Tee und ihn bildend oben und sagen, hat schauen Sie dargestellt heraus geduckt, wem wir schon sind? Und I sehr versuchsweise und ohne überzeugung an ganz gut gesagt, bedeute ich bin Sie das MNJ? Und er gibt mir einen disdainful Blick und sagt in Wirklichkeit mich bedeutet was I herum hängen mit jenen Truthähnen tun würde, Sie weiß? Ich bin Senegalese. Ich habe nichts, mit Niger Politik zu tun.
Er sagte nicht alles den, sagte er gerade, daß „ich Senegalese bin“. Und ich sagte „OH-“. Und dann sagt er: 'Wir sind Al-Qaeda. Und die Unterseite meiner Welt fiel heraus. '
Und… bin ich ein Kerl, der ständig Art das Laufen lassen der dummen Statistiken in seinem Verstand ist, Sie weiß? Ich bedeute werde daß Lichtänderung, bevor ich bis 10 zähle? Und was die Vorteile von meinem tuend etwas sind, bevor der erste Schnee fliegt, oder Sie wissen, diese Art der Sache.
So was die Vorteile ich sind, aus dieses lebendige herauskommen war offensichtlich werden ein grosses. Und an diesem Punkt, Abbildung ich fünf Prozent, weil niedriger auch niederdrückte. Aber „wir sind Al-Qaeda“, und dort dann, fängt Peter, alle Ihre Berechnungen früh an.
So sind sie Al-Qaeda und was ist die UNO, die geht, angesichts des Als-Qaeda zu tun? Was wird die Regierung von Kanada angesichts des Als-Qaeda tun? Was wird der Westen tun?
MANSBRIDGE: Wünschten sie Sie, weil Sie UNO waren, oder weil Sie kanadisch waren?
FOWLER: UNO.
MANSBRIDGE: Kam die kanadische Ausgabe oben an allen?
FOWLER: Nr., denke ich, daß es eine zusätzliche Prämie für sie war. Aber sie - aber ich denke, daß dieser aller zurück zu ihrer Mission geht und ob oder nicht wir ein Ziel der Gelegenheit oder eine gerichtete Mission waren. So war es ein grosser UNO Kerl ist, was, ist, was sie ergriffen.
Nachdem „wir sind Al-Qaeda“, und wir sind reisend immer mehr - überhaupt fördern nordwârts, und kein Zweifel das Glauben niedrig, beschädigt und nicht sehr mutig, ich um um den Treiber, ist bat es Ihre Absicht, uns durchzuführen?
Ich weiß nicht, warum ich um um den bat. Ich bin nicht ich wünschte wirklich die Antwort sicher. Aber dennoch. But he reacted with very satisfying anger, sort of saying 'nah'. I mean, he said: 'Listen, my mission was to capture you. If my mission had been to execute you, you'd be dead. So don't give me any more of that crap.' I mean that was the idea, which again I found a rather happy response.
MANSBRIDGE: You believed him?
FOWLER: Oh boy, that's a big question then and at any future point. I certainly wanted to believe him, so that would do for a while. Yeah.
MANSBRIDGE VOICE-OVER: The chaotic first days stretched into weeks. After 56 hours of brutal off-road driving, a trip that fractured one of Fowler's vertebrae, the hostages were shuffled from camp to camp in northern Mali. All the while, he was held at gunpoint by 20 insurgents, one as young as seven.
Camp life became routine. Fowler wore out his shoes through daily exercise, repairing them with thorns. And he secretly kept track of days by marking his leather belt.
MANSBRIDGE: Tell me about movie night.
FOWLER: As night falls they take three spare tires and pile them one on top of the other, haul out their nifty laptop, plug it into the engine, to the cigarette lighter in the engine compartment, and fire it up and we watch what we call TV night. They would have [a video view] of sniper rifles as they sort of popped the heads off GIs in Iraq and Afghanistan, endless IEDs [improvised explosive devices] blowing up Humvees, trucks and convoys in Iraq and Afghanistan. Lots of suicide bombers crashing through gates blowing up, some buildings … and every time this would happen the audience would scream and wasn't that great.
MANSBRIDGE: Every time there was a TV night they'd play the same?
FOWLER: Oh no, sometimes they had new [movies]. Al-Qaeda central would send them a new hot DVD. Actually the only time I saw real excitement was a guy running in from with a new DVD. Boy, you know we have a bestseller tonight. And they would, it was clearly these were propaganda films, rather good production values. I mean they were well made. It was to pump up the boys. I mean to remind them of what it was all about, and they were Mujahadeen and death in the calls is what it's all about and we will prevail. I eventually refused to go to TV night, but created a bit of an issue, but not a huge issue, a bit of an issue. I said I had seen the twin towers come down 400 times. I don't need to see them again.
MANSBRIDGE: Now you became featured in videos yourself?
FOWLER: Yes.
MANSBRIDGE: There were three in total?
FOWLER: Four actually.
MANSBRIDGE: Four. And now the idea initially was 'proof of life' videos?
FOWLER: Yes that's certainly what I thought. They're not all the same. But the first one we did on Day 5. We were ushered into a tent. The only time we were ever in a tent was to make videos. I didn't like tents. Every time I walked into a tent I remembered Daniel Pearl and it wasn't a good memory.
Each one was different, very different. The first one was what I kind of expected to be; it was proof of life. I'd seen the movies. I knew that that's what had to happen and I knew that that meant my family would know that I was captured and they were not going to be real happy about the al-Qaeda part of it.
I think I was suggesting to you they're not technically incompetent. I mean just a total contradiction of these guys festooned with sat phones, cell phones, GPSs, walkie-talkies, video cameras and laptops — whose minds are 15 centuries away, whose weapons are a couple of generations old, and who really wish they didn't have rifles and could get back to the days of the scimitar and saber. Strange contradictions.
Video three was very different. Somber. No backdrop when we got in there. Hands behind our back. Blindfolded for the first time. And we're told 'don't speak'. You have no speaking role. Don't speak.
And all I know of that video was I guy intoning behind me a long screed in Arabic with lots of references to al-Qaeda, Jihad, Muhjahadeen, Allah and Allahu Akhbar and blindfolds came off, we were taken out of the tent, taken back to our tree and left alone, absolutely alone. Nobody talked to us, nobody came near us.
And I did not feel happy about that. I didn't know what had happened. I guessed — and does it happen I think I guessed absolutely accurately — it was a death threat, an ultimatum.
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Robert Fowler sequestrado
Automatically translated into Portuguese thanks to WorldLingo
Transcript EXCLUSIVO da NOTÍCIA
de CBC: O diplomata canadense da entrevista
de Robert Fowler fala com o Peter Mansbridge sobre seu último do ordeal
do abduction atualizado: Terça-feira, setembro 8, 2009 | 10:57 PM ET a notícia Robert
Fowler de Comments0Recommend6CBC falam sobre como foi capturado, o que lhe aconteceram no captiveiro e como ele foi liberado eventualy em um exclusive da notícia de CBC. (Notícia de Tom Sharina/CBC) esta é a história do untold do diplomata canadense Robert Fowler, que, por 130 dias no começo desse ano, foi prendido no gunpoint e sob a ameaça constante da execução.
Para aqueles quatro e uma metade dos meses era vivendo, comendo, viajando e dormindo com al-Qaeda quando as negociações desesperadas das atrás--cenas ocorreram para tentar livrar o e seu assistente, Louis Guay.
O seguinte é um transcript da entrevista de Peter Mansbridge com Fowler, que arejou terça-feira, Sept. 8, no nacional. É um interior deparada do olhar um o kidnapping pela organização a mais temida do terrorista do mundo.
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MANSBRIDGE: Bem, foi um par dos meses agora desde que o ordeal terminou. Como é você?
FOWLER: Eu penso de bom bonito. Eu ouvi apenas uma história ontem dos UN de um guy que fosse feito exame do tempo mais ou menos idêntico enquanto nós estávamos em Paquistão e em Baluchistan. Pensou que era bom bonito e cinco meses mais tarde, sem nenhuma observação, caiu em partes. Assim eu tenho que dar-lhe uma resposta rather imediata e provisória: assim distante, assim bom.
MANSBRIDGE: Você ainda assim, embora, têm os momentos diários, cada par dos dias, onde você pensam dele unprompted? Ou seja ninguém pergunta-lhe que, você apenas começa de repente pensar sobre ele?
FOWLER: Eu. E todos os tipos do disparador das coisas ele. , Talvez o momento o mais estranho, e mim estava falando a meu pal, Louis Guay, que estava neste com mim, o outro dia e nós ambos temos exatamente a mesma reação. É, ele é unreal. Eu significo ele aconteci? Era realmente como aquele? Ou sou eu, am I imaginando algum do material? E então de repente, você começará uma outra memória que o lembre que era exatamente como aquela.
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MANSBRIDGE VOICE-OVER: Bob Fowler não era nenhum diplomata canadense ordinário. Por décadas estava na borda principal de iniciativas extrangeiras deste país. Regularmente no righthand de ministros principais, tinha trabalhado sua maneira para cima através dos trajetos frequentemente traiçoeiros da burocracia de Ottawa. Seus supporters elogiaram-no para seus intellect e compassion. Seus foes viram o como stubborn e controlar. Então, em 2006, em 62, aposentou-se com honra e accolades.
Mas a “aposentadoria” não estava realmente no vocabulário de Bob Fowler. África era. E era ao continente - uma paixão carreira-longa para Fowler que as nações unidas pediram que fosse. Recursos minerais de um excesso nasty da disputa entre o governo de Niger e o movimento rebel MNJ como a missão. Encontrar a paz era o desafio.
Mas preferivelmente, em uma tarde preguiçosa de domingo imediatamente antes do Christmas, ao longo da única estrada pavimentada de Niger, apenas 30 minutos fora do capital, mundo de Bob Fowler giraram em um nightmare.
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FOWLER: De repente há um caminhão que passa nos. Nós estamos indo realmente rápidos e está indo mais rapidamente, e não é um Lamborghini, ele é um caminhão. Que é errado com este retrato, você sabe?
MANSBRIDGE: Você soube que havia algo erradamente com o retrato?
FOWLER: No., não ainda. No., exceto - bom eu recordo - vai perto e imediatamente as fatias através da estrada, direita na frente de nós. Eu significo o whoa, mim significo realmente perigoso, scary e nosso excitador e balanço imediatamente para fora para passá-lo, que no ponto balança para fora outra vez. Então eu soube que nós estávamos no problema.
Antes que nós pararmos completamente… os dois guys, caras africanas, na parte traseira da camionete vaulting sobre a borda. Um guy vaulting sobre a borda com seu Kalashnikov altamente e o outro guy está apontando com seu Kalashnikov que aponta da parte traseira do caminhão em linha reta no excitador, de quatro medidores afastado.
MANSBRIDGE: Assim você sabe que neste momento não há nenhuma dúvida o que está acontecendo?
FOWLER: Não há nenhuma dúvida o que está acontecendo, e mim para pensar - este é o cliché dum raio o mais grande de toda a hora - como pode este acontecer-me? Eu significo que eu tenho gastado muito tempo em África. Este é os oito por cento seguro do país. Isto é o lugar onde o embassy tem seus piqueniques em domingo. Por que? Isto não é direito. Que está acontecendo? ... Eu penso que a coisa fêz exame de 35 a 45 segundos do começo à extremidade.
MANSBRIDGE: Do começo…?
FOWLER: Assim que eu realizar deste não é a, você sabe, os idiots na estrada, esta são algo mais. A nosso dever no outro caminhão, forçado encontrar-se para baixo sob um cobertor muito smelly, oleoso com, com estes dois guys que sentam-se no alto de nós, do carro que faz uma volta e a raia de 180 graus no outro sentido. Aquele era 45 segundos.
Esta coisa foi ajustada como bem acima? Lá há umas indicações que era muito bom ajustado acima.
Eu tenho que admitir, ele fui executado também muito eficientemente. A porta offside traseira estava aberta rasgado. Louis estava sendo sorte do râ-marchado atrás do excitador na parte dianteira. Ambos [eles] eram sorte de ser jogado no carro na parte dianteira. Louis era sorte do ajuntado através de seus sobrancelha e olho com o foreside de um AK. Eu estava no outro lado, no interior. E querido saber se eu, poderia fazer um funcionamento para ele. Disparariam se eu fizesse um funcionamento para ele?
Eu estaria abandonando Louis e o excitador se eu? Pelo tempo eu tinha articulado as perguntas, eu estava na parte traseira desse caminhão e, e nós fizemos esta sorte de screeching 180 [volta do grau]. E porque eu era forçado para baixo, eu recordo ir agora a outra maneira, olhar e ver nosso carro lá e estar 100 por cento certo que deve haver um de seus guys aproximadamente a pular nele e para o dirigir fora. Um recurso muito valioso.
Como nós sabemos agora, como eu encontrei para fora somente quando eu saí, à esquerda o carro lá, sete horas na estrada, com as três de suas quatro portas abrem, o corredor do motor e o farol intermitente sobre.
MANSBRIDGE: Uma das perguntas de que a sorte nagged algum sobre o momento da captação é porque havia justo você, Louis Guay e o excitador no veículo - e porque não havia alguma proteção.
FOWLER: Direita, yeah.
MANSBRIDGE: Você estêve ao redor e você estêve em níveis sênior da burocracia e com os UN. Você teve obviamente o treinamento nestas coisas. Eu aprecio que esta área particular estêve considerada um tanto cofre, mas você seria um alvo do perfil. Por que havia nenhuma segurança?
FOWLER: Pesaroso. Não era - não se considerou um tanto seguro, ele era seguro. Era…
MANSBRIDGE: Mas não era.
FOWLER: Jorra o No., ele não era. E vamos começar a isso.
Mas o Embassy canadense tem tomado parte num piquenique lá a semana antes. O governo inteiro estava indo acima dessa estrada em dois dias. Havia uns bornes das polícias ao longo da estrada e estava nos oito por cento do país que era verde no mapa da segurança dos UN.
Eu estive em circunstâncias mais menos seguras com nenhuma proteção. O negócio com os UN, e realmente com países também, é você segurança da licença ao país de anfitrião. E a maneira que nós faríamos o itinerary é que nós emitimos aquele ao escritório dos UN em que nós dissemos somos aqui as coisas nós queremos fazer e, sobre o fim de semana, nós queremos sair um pouco no campo e nós queremos ir a esta mina.
[Nós] contanto que aos escritórios dos UN, os UN fornecem-nos então aquele ao governo, e - eu suponho por causa do speculation, você falei sobre ele. Eu verifiquei quando eu comecei para trás e eu comecei os email do escritório dos UN que digo sim, mais mais a sua pergunta, me posso confirmar que nós passamos seu itinerary a todos os povos apropriados. Assim não há nenhuma dúvida que tiveram.
Eu não sei se este for direito, Peter, mas eu penso que eu sou provavelmente a criatura a mais sênior dos UN que apreenderam.
MANSBRIDGE: Mas a edição torna-se: Se soubessem quem agarravam, encontrariam exatamente onde você está.
FOWLER: Exatamente.
MANSBRIDGE: E os outros povos que sabem aquele são todos - muitos dos povos, eu suponho, no fim do dia - que começou os UN itinerary.
FOWLER: Você começou-o.
MANSBRIDGE: E você começou um governo que provavelmente não gostasse demasiado da idéia inteira de porque você estava lá no primeiro lugar.
FOWLER: Odiaram minha missão.
MANSBRIDGE: Porque poderia somente lhes ser um custo a longo prazo. Todo o negócio ser-lhes-ia um custo.
FOWLER: Yeah. O presidente de Niger, cujo o nome é Tanja. Estava desobstruído de a primeira vez que eu me encontrei com o em agosto que offended, irritado, embarrassed pelo fato que o secretário geral dos UN tinha visto o ajuste para apontar um envoy especial para seu país. No fato, algum do material que eu li desde que eu saí, com spokespeople do governo de Niger falando sobre minha missão. Disseram que eu estava lá ver se eu poderia começar a preensão dos braços illicit que trafico, que não era minha missão.
Minha missão era começar o governo fazer a paz com os rebels. Contanto que não houvesse nenhuma paz com os rebels, o inimigo estava na porta, direita? Se o al-Qaeda estiver fazendo exame de povos nos outskirts da cidade, o inimigo realmente na porta. E governance de makes sentido da segurança nacional, direita?
Assim eu não sei quem comprou mim. Eu sei que alguém comprou mim. Quem podia ele ser? Podia ser o governo de Niger. Poderia ser um sympathizer do al-Qaeda no escritório dos UN em Niger. No escritório dos UN em África ocidental. No edifício do secretariat em New York. Todo tiveram minha agenda, meu itinerary.
MANSBRIDGE: Você tem seu passport com você?
FOWLER: No., eu não tive nada, que os dirigiu loucos. Dirigiu-os absolutamente loucos. Um guy deu-me o inferno. Eu significo que é irresponsible sair sem seus originais. Quem você pensa de você é?
MANSBRIDGE: Você disse-lhes que você era?
FOWLER: Sim, imediatamente eu disse-lhes que que eu era, e não eram…
MANSBRIDGE: E por que você havia?
FOWLER: No., nós não começamos em alguma daquele.
MANSBRIDGE: O No., mas eu significa quando você disse que “eu sou Robert Fowler, mim sou o representante especial dos UN. ”?
FOWLER: Sim.
MANSBRIDGE: Você disse aquele?
FOWLER: Eu disse aquele. Perguntaram-me que que eu era e eu disse aquele. E eram - eram unsurprised por aquele. E então Louis teve seu passer do laissez dos UN com ele, que é o passport dos UN, e meu passer do laissez e meu passport canadense estavam sentando-se em meu cofre do hotel.
Fizeram exame do seu material de Louis do relógio e em seu bolso. Para alguma razão não fizeram exame de meu relógio viajando barato. Feito para muggers.
MANSBRIDGE: Podiam dizer um knockoff.
FOWLER: Yeah, isso é direito, exatamente…. Assim fazem este e são tipo de moer em torno de um bocado. E eu tenho um momento, apenas um momento, e eu disse Louis, digo-lhes a verdade. Não importa o que acontece, diga-lhes a verdade. Você não tem qualquer coisa que é assim importante de proteger que vale a pena sua vida.
MANSBRIDGE: Agora porque você disse aquele?
FOWLER: Porque eu disse se você começar dizer mentiras, você começará travado acima em suas próprias correias fotorreceptoras e você perderá toda a abilidade. Eu não disse todo o aquele. Aquele é o que estava em minha mente.
MANSBRIDGE: Mas você dizia que porque aquele é Bob Fowler que pensa ou você dizia que porque aquele é o treinamento você começa?
FOWLER: O No., aquele é mim que pensa.
MANSBRIDGE: Porque você deve ter tido o treinamento.
FOWLER: Ninguém treinou-me sempre em ser um refém.
MANSBRIDGE: Realmente?
FOWLER: Não.
MANSBRIDGE: Os níveis do sénior que você estava nunca no tido todo o treinamento como aquele?
FOWLER: No., nunca. Mas aquele era livros do espião da leitura e filmes prestando atenção. E talvez sentido bom.
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FOWLER: Em algum lugar muito tarde, eu significo quatro ou cinco na manhã, nós, nós parei. Um cobertor é jogado na terra e nós somos ditos que o “descanso,” e o excitador saem de seu carro, rastejam sob o caminhão ao descanso. Um dos soldados descansa, e outro é o sentry no protetor, e está fazendo o chá.
A notícia de CBC obteve este retrato do cellphone. Isto é a primeira vez que uma imagem de Robert Fowler no captiveiro foi feita a público. Eu não posso encontrar-se para baixo no tapete porque minha parte traseira fere demasiado. E eu ando então para este guy e crouched sobre este fogo minúsculo, fazendo seus chá e o olha acima e diz, você figurou para fora quem nós somos ainda? E I muito tentatively e com nenhuma convicção no dito toda bem, eu significo sou você o MNJ? E dá-me um olhar disdainful e diz-me, de fato, significa o que I estaria fazendo a suspensão ao redor com aqueles perus, você sabe? Eu sou Senegalese. Eu não tenho nada fazer com política de Niger.
Não disse todo o aquele, disse apenas que “eu sou Senegalese”. E eu disse o “oh”. E então diz: 'Nós somos al-Qaeda. E o fundo de meu mundo caiu para fora. '
E… eu sou um guy que seja constantemente sorte de funcionar statistics stupid em sua mente, você sei? Eu significo que mudança da luz antes que eu conte a 10? E o que são as probabilidades do meu que fazem algo antes que a primeira neve voar ou você souber, essa sorte da coisa.
Assim o que são as probabilidades mim está indo sair deste vivo era obviamente grande. E nesse ponto, eu figurei cinco por cento porque mais baixo estava comprimindo demasiado. Mas “nós somos al-Qaeda”, e lá então, Peter, começa todos seus cálculos mais cedo.
Assim são al-Qaeda, e que é os UN que vão fazer vis-a-vis o al-Qaeda? Que o governo de Canadá está indo fazer vis-a-vis o al-Qaeda? Que o oeste está indo fazer?
MANSBRIDGE: Quiseram-no porque você era UN ou porque você era canadense?
FOWLER: UN.
MANSBRIDGE: A edição canadense veio acima em tudo?
FOWLER: No., eu penso que era um bônus adicionado para eles. Mas eles - mas eu penso que este tudo vai para trás a sua missão e se ou não nós éramos um alvo da oportunidade ou uma missão alvejada. Assim era um guy grande dos UN é o que, é o que agarrou.
Depois que “nós são al-Qaeda”, e nós são viajando mais e mais - sempre promovem para o norte, e nenhum dúvida sentir baixo, danificado e não muito courageous, mim pediu o excitador, é sua intenção executar-nos?
Eu não sei porque eu pedi aquele. Eu não sou certo mim quis realmente a resposta. Mas não obstante. But he reacted with very satisfying anger, sort of saying 'nah'. I mean, he said: 'Listen, my mission was to capture you. If my mission had been to execute you, you'd be dead. So don't give me any more of that crap.' I mean that was the idea, which again I found a rather happy response.
MANSBRIDGE: You believed him?
FOWLER: Oh boy, that's a big question then and at any future point. I certainly wanted to believe him, so that would do for a while. Yeah.
MANSBRIDGE VOICE-OVER: The chaotic first days stretched into weeks. After 56 hours of brutal off-road driving, a trip that fractured one of Fowler's vertebrae, the hostages were shuffled from camp to camp in northern Mali. All the while, he was held at gunpoint by 20 insurgents, one as young as seven.
Camp life became routine. Fowler wore out his shoes through daily exercise, repairing them with thorns. And he secretly kept track of days by marking his leather belt.
MANSBRIDGE: Tell me about movie night.
FOWLER: As night falls they take three spare tires and pile them one on top of the other, haul out their nifty laptop, plug it into the engine, to the cigarette lighter in the engine compartment, and fire it up and we watch what we call TV night. They would have [a video view] of sniper rifles as they sort of popped the heads off GIs in Iraq and Afghanistan, endless IEDs [improvised explosive devices] blowing up Humvees, trucks and convoys in Iraq and Afghanistan. Lots of suicide bombers crashing through gates blowing up, some buildings … and every time this would happen the audience would scream and wasn't that great.
MANSBRIDGE: Every time there was a TV night they'd play the same?
FOWLER: Oh no, sometimes they had new [movies]. Al-Qaeda central would send them a new hot DVD. Actually the only time I saw real excitement was a guy running in from with a new DVD. Boy, you know we have a bestseller tonight. And they would, it was clearly these were propaganda films, rather good production values. I mean they were well made. It was to pump up the boys. I mean to remind them of what it was all about, and they were Mujahadeen and death in the calls is what it's all about and we will prevail. I eventually refused to go to TV night, but created a bit of an issue, but not a huge issue, a bit of an issue. I said I had seen the twin towers come down 400 times. I don't need to see them again.
MANSBRIDGE: Now you became featured in videos yourself?
FOWLER: Yes.
MANSBRIDGE: There were three in total?
FOWLER: Four actually.
MANSBRIDGE: Four. And now the idea initially was 'proof of life' videos?
FOWLER: Yes that's certainly what I thought. They're not all the same. But the first one we did on Day 5. We were ushered into a tent. The only time we were ever in a tent was to make videos. I didn't like tents. Every time I walked into a tent I remembered Daniel Pearl and it wasn't a good memory.
Each one was different, very different. The first one was what I kind of expected to be; it was proof of life. I'd seen the movies. I knew that that's what had to happen and I knew that that meant my family would know that I was captured and they were not going to be real happy about the al-Qaeda part of it.
I think I was suggesting to you they're not technically incompetent. I mean just a total contradiction of these guys festooned with sat phones, cell phones, GPSs, walkie-talkies, video cameras and laptops — whose minds are 15 centuries away, whose weapons are a couple of generations old, and who really wish they didn't have rifles and could get back to the days of the scimitar and saber. Strange contradictions.
Video three was very different. Somber. No backdrop when we got in there. Hands behind our back. Blindfolded for the first time. And we're told 'don't speak'. You have no speaking role. Don't speak.
And all I know of that video was I guy intoning behind me a long screed in Arabic with lots of references to al-Qaeda, Jihad, Muhjahadeen, Allah and Allahu Akhbar and blindfolds came off, we were taken out of the tent, taken back to our tree and left alone, absolutely alone. Nobody talked to us, nobody came near us.
And I did not feel happy about that. I didn't know what had happened. I guessed — and does it happen I think I guessed absolutely accurately — it was a death threat, an ultimatum.
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Robert rövade bort Fowler
Automatically translated into Swedish thanks to WorldLingo
Avskrift för CBC-NYHETERNA
ARTIKEL MED ENSAMRÄTT: Talar den kanadensiska diplomaten
för den Robert Fowler intervjun med Peter Mansbridge om hans kidnappningpärs som
uppdateras sist: Tisdag September 8, 2009 | 10:57 PM ET Comments0Recommend6CBC-nyheterna
Robert Fowler talar om, hur han fångades, vad händde till honom i fångenskap och hur honom var eventualy utsläppt i en CBC-nyheternaartikel med ensamrätt. (Tom Sharina/CBC nyheterna) är denna untoldberättelsen av den kanadensiska diplomaten Robert Fowler, som, för 130 dagar tidigare detta år, rymdes på pistolhotet och under konstant hot av utförandet.
För de fyra och en halva månader var han bo och att äta som reser, och att sova med desperat bak--platser för al-Qaedastunder förhandlingar ägde rum till försök att frigöra honom och hans assistent, Louis Guay.
Efter är en avskrift av den Peter Mansbridges intervjun med Fowler, som luftade tisdag, Sept. 8 på medborgare. Det är enstoppande lookinsida per kidnappning vid världens den mest fruktade terroristorganisationen.
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MANSBRIDGE: Välla fram det har varit en koppla ihop av månader nu, sedan pärsen avslutade. Hur är du?
FOWLER: Nätt goda för funderare I. I hörde precis en berättelse igår från UNNA av en grabb som togs om den samma tiden, som vi var i Pakistan och Baluchistan. Han tänkte att han var nätt bra och fem månader mer sistnämnd, utan några märker, avverkningen in i lappar. Så måste jag att ge dig ett snarlikt omgående och tillfälligt svar: så långt, så goda.
MANSBRIDGE: Stillar du, fast, har dagliga ögonblick, varje kopplar ihop av dagar, var som dig, unprompted funderare av den? Med andra ord, frågar inget dig, startar du som är rättvis plötsligt, tänkande om det?
FOWLER: Jag. Och alla sorter av saker startar det. , Kanske det konstigaste ögonblicket och mig talade till min pal, Louis Guay, som var i denna med mig, häromdagen, och vi båda har exakt den samma reaktionen. Det är, det är overkligt. Jag betyder det händde? Var det egentligen likt att? Eller förmiddag I, förmiddag I som föreställer någon av stoppa? Och därefter plötsligt, ska du får ett annat minne som ska påminner dig att det var exakt likt att.
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MANSBRIDGE VOICE-OVER: Egennamn Fowler var ingen det vanligakanadensarediplomat. För årtionden var han på framkanten av detta lands utländska insatser. Regelbundet på righthanden av premiärministerar, hade han fungerat his långt uppåt till och med de ofta förrädiska banorna av den Ottawa byråkratin. Hans supportrar lovordade honom för hans intellekt och medkänsla. Hans foes sågar honom som envis och att kontrollera. Därefter i 2006, på 62, avgick han med heder och hyllningar.
Men ”var avgången” inte egentligen i egennamnFowlers ordlista. Afrika var. Och det var till kontinenten - enlång passion för Fowler - som Förenta nationen frågade honom att gå. En otäck tvist över mineraliska resurser mellan regeringen av Niger och den rebelliska rörelsen MNJ som beskickningen. Att finna fred var utmaningen.
Men i stället, på en lat söndageftermiddag för precis julen, längs Niger enda stenlade huvudväg, precis 30 noterar utanför huvudstaden, egennamnFowlers vände värld in i en mardröm.
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FOWLER: Plötsligt finns det en åka lastbilbortgång oss. Vi går egentligen fastar, och han går snabbare, och han är inte en Lamborghini, honom är en åka lastbil. Är vad fel med detta föreställer, vet du?
MANSBRIDGE: Du visste att det fanns något orätt med föreställa?
FOWLER: Nr. inte ännu. Nr.en undantar - väl jag minns - honom går by och omgående skivor över vägen som rätt är främre av oss. Jag betyder whoa, mig betyder egentligen farligt, läskigt och vår chaufför och svänger omgående ut för att passera honom, som peka på honom svänger ut igen. Därefter visste jag att vi var besvärar in.
För vi hade ganska stoppat…, de två grabbarna, afrikan vänder mot, i baksidaen av uppsamlingen åker lastbil välver över kanta. En grabb välver över kanta med hans Kalashnikov kick, och den annan grabben siktar med hans Kalashnikov som siktar från baksidaen av åka lastbilraksträckan på chauffören, från fyra räkneverk bort.
MANSBRIDGE: Så vet du på denna pekar där är inget tvivel vad händer?
FOWLER: Det finns inget tvivel vad händer, och I funderare - denna är den mest stora förbaskade tiden för klichéer allra - hur kan detta hända till mig? Jag betyder att jag har spenderat en raddatid i Afrika. Denna är kassaskåpet åtta procent av landet. Detta är var ambassaden har deras picknickar på söndag. Why? Detta är inte högert. Händer vad? ... Funderare I som tinget tog från 35 till 45, understöder från början för att avsluta.
MANSBRIDGE: Från början…?
FOWLER: Från, så snart som jag realiserade, detta inte är a, dig vet, är idioter på vägen, denna någontingen annat. Till vårt vara i annat åka lastbil, tvingade för att ligga besegrar under en mycket stinka oljig filt med, med sammanträde för dessa två grabbar överst av oss, bilen som har gjort en 180 grad vänd och, görar strimmig i den annan riktningen. Det var 45 understöder.
Var hur väl detta ting fastställdt övre? Det där finns indikeringar som det var den mycket väl uppsättningen upp.
Jag måste att medge, det också utfördes mycket effektivt. Den offside- bakre dörren var sönderriven öppnar. Louis var sorterar av groda-marscherat bak chauffören framme. Båda av [dem] var sorterar av att kastas in i bilen framme. Louis var sorterar av krattat över hans ögonbryn och synar med foresiden av en AK. Jag var på andra sidan, på insidan. Och undrat, om jag bör, kunde göra en körning för den. Skulle skjuter de, om jag gjorde en körning för den?
Skulle I överger Louis och chauffören, om jag? Vid tiden som jag hade artikulerat, ifrågasätter, var jag i baksidaen av det åker lastbil och, och vi gjorde denna sorterar av screeching av 180 [gradvänden]. Och som jag tvingades besegrar, mig minns att gå nu annan långt, att se och att se vår bil där och, vara 100 procent bestämt att det bör finnas en av deras grabbar omkring som hoppar in i den och som kör av den. Mycket en värdesaktillgång.
Som vi vet nu, som I som ut fanns, då endast jag fick ut, lämnade de bilen där, sju timmar på vägen, med tre av dess fyra dörrar öppnar, motorspringet och blinkeren på.
MANSBRIDGE: En av ifrågasätter som sortera av har tjatat något om ögonblicket av tillfångatagandet är, varför det fanns rättvist dig, Louis Guay och chauffören i medlet - och varför det inte fanns något skydd.
FOWLER: Högert yeah.
MANSBRIDGE: Du har varit omkring, och du har varit i pensionär jämnar av byråkratin och med UNNA. Du har självfallet haft utbildning på dessa saker. Jag uppskattar att detta särskilda område var den något ansedda kassaskåpet, men du skulle har varit en profilera uppsätta som mål. Why fanns det ingen säkerhet?
FOWLER: Ledset. Det var inte - det var inte den ansedda något kassaskåpet, det var kassaskåpet. Det var…,
MANSBRIDGE: Men det var inte.
FOWLER: Den väl nr.en, var det inte. Och låt oss får till det.
Men den kanadensiska ambassaden hade haft picknick där veckan för. Den hela regeringen gick upp dagar för den väg itu. Det fanns polisen postar längs vägen, och den var i de åtta procentna av landet som var grönt på UN-säkerheten kartlägger.
Jag har varit i mindre kassaskåpomständigheter med inget skydd. Avtalet med UNNA och egentligen med länder som väl, är dig tjänstledighetsäkerhet till vara värdlandet. Och långt skulle vi gör resplanen är att vi överför det till UN-kontoret som vi sade i är här saker som, vi önskar att göra, och, över tillbringa veckoslutet, önskar vi att få ut i bygden a bet lite, och vi önskar att gå till denna som är min.
[Oss] förutsatt att, att till UN-kontoren, UNNA ger därefter det till regeringen, och dem - jag gissar på grund av spekulationen, dig som är omtalad det. Jag kontrollerade, när jag fick baksida och jag fick e-post från UN-kontorsordstävet ja, mer ytterligare till ditt ifrågasätter, mig kan bekräfta att vi har passerat din resplan till alla anslår folk. Så det finns inte något tvivel som de hade.
Jag vet inte, om denna är höger, förmiddagen för Peter, utan I-funderare I antagligen den mest höga UN-varelsen som de har gripit.
MANSBRIDGE: Men utfärda blir: Om de visste vem de grep, skulle de fynd exakt var du är.
FOWLER: Exakt.
MANSBRIDGE: Och det annat folket, som vet det, är alla - folk för en radda, jag gissar, på avsluta av dagen - som fick UNNA rese-.
FOWLER: Du fick det.
MANSBRIDGE: Och du har fått en regering som inte gillade antagligen för mycket den hela idén av varför du var i första förlägger där.
FOWLER: De hatade min beskickning.
MANSBRIDGE: Därför att det kunde endast vara en kosta till dem på sikt. Något avtal skulle är en kosta till dem.
FOWLER: Yeah. Presidenten av Niger, vars känd är Tanja. Det var klart från den första tiden som jag mötte honom i Augusti att han kränktes, förargat, generat av faktumet att sekreteraren - generalen av UNNA hade sett passformen att bestämma en special sändebud för hans land. I faktum någon av stoppa som jag har läst, sedan jag fick ut, med Niger regerings- spokespeople som talar om min beskickning. De sade att jag var där att se, om jag kunde få hållen av olagligt beväpnar människohandeln, som inte var min beskickning.
Min beskickning var att få regeringen att göra fred med rebellerna. Så länge som det inte fanns någon fred med rebellerna, var fienden på utfärda utegångsförbud för som var höger? Om al-Qaeda tar folk på utkanten av staden, fienden egentligen på utfärda utegångsförbud för. Och makt av nationell säkerhetmakesavkänning som är höger?
Så vet jag inte vem shoppade mig. Jag vet att någon shoppade mig. Kunde vem det vara? Det kunde vara regeringen av Niger. Vara kunde en al-Qaedasympatisör i UN-kontoret i Niger. I UN-kontoret i västra Afrika. I secretariatbyggnaden i New York. Alla dem hade min dagordning, min resplan.
MANSBRIDGE: Har du ditt pass med dig?
FOWLER: Nr.en hade jag ingenting, som drösen dem som är galna. Drös dem som absolut är galna. En grabb gav mig helvete. Jag betyder att det är ansvarslöst att gå ut utan dina dokument. vem dig funderare som du är?
MANSBRIDGE: Berättade du dem som du var?
FOWLER: Ja, omgående berättade jag dem att som jag var, och de inte var…,
MANSBRIDGE: Och why dig fanns det?
FOWLER: Nr.en fick vi inte in i några av det.
MANSBRIDGE: Nr.en men jag betyder, då du sade ”I-förmiddagen Robert Fowler, I-förmiddagen den representativa UN-sakkunniga. ”?
FOWLER: Ja.
MANSBRIDGE: Du sade det?
FOWLER: Jag sade det. De frågade mig att som jag var och, jag sade det. Och de var - de var unsurprised vid det. Och därefter hade Louis hans UN-laissezförbipasserande med honom, som är UN-passet, och min laissezförbipasserande och mitt kanadensiska pass var sammanträde i min hotellkassaskåp.
De tog Louiss klocka, och his stoppar i hans fick-. De för något resonerar tog inte min billiga resande klocka. Gjort för plugghästar.
MANSBRIDGE: De kunde berätta en knockoff.
FOWLER: Yeah är det höger, exakt…., Så gör de detta, och de är sorten av att mala runt om a bet. Och jag har ett ögonblick, precis ett ögonblick, och jag sade Louis, berättar dem sanningen. Ingen materia vad händer, berättar dem sanningen. Du har inte något som är så viktig att skydda att den är värd ditt liv.
MANSBRIDGE: Varför nu du något att säga det?
FOWLER: Därför att jag sade, om du startar träffande lies, ska du får fångad upp i dina egna rengöringsdukar, och du ska förlorar någon kapacitet. Jag inte den all något att säga det. Det är vad var i mitt varar besvärad.
MANSBRIDGE: Men var du ordstävet som, därför att det är egennamn tänkande Fowler, eller var du ordstävet som, därför att det är utbildningen dig får?
FOWLER: Nr.en det är mig som är tänkande.
MANSBRIDGE: Därför att du måste ha haft utbildning.
FOWLER: Inget utbildade någonsin mig i att vara en gisslan.
MANSBRIDGE: Egentligen?
FOWLER: Nr.
MANSBRIDGE: Pensionären jämnar att du var på aldrig ht någon utbildningsnågot liknande det?
FOWLER: Nr. aldrig. Men det var den läs- spionen bokar och hållande ögonen på filmer. Och kanske bra avkänning.
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FOWLER: Någonstans mycket sent, betyder jag fyra eller fem i morgonen, oss, oss stoppade. En filt kastas på det slipat, och vi berättas att ”vila,” och chauffören får ut ur hans bil, krypanden under åka lastbil vila. En av soldaterna vilar, och annan är vaktposten på vakt, och han är danandetea.
CBC-nyheterna har erhållit denna mobiltelefon föreställer. Denna är den första tiden som en avbilda av Robert Fowler i fångenskap har gjorts allmänhet. Jag kan inte ligga besegrar på filten, därför att min baksida görar ond för mycket. Och jag går därefter in mot denna grabb, och har han huka sig ned över detta mycket litet avfyrar, danande hans tea, och ser han upp, och har något att säga, dig som är utklurad vem vi är ännu? Och I mycket tentatively och med ingen övertygelse sade alls väl, mig betyder är dig MNJEN? Och han ger mig en disdainful look, och verkställer något att säga, in, mig betyder skulle att vad, gör I att hänga omkring med de kalkoner, vet du? Senegalesisk förmiddag I. Jag har ingenting att göra med Niger politik.
Han inte den all något att säga det, sade han precis ”den senegalesiska I-förmiddagen”. Och jag sade ”oh”. Och därefter honom något att säga: 'Är vi al-Qaeda. Och bottnen av min världsavverkning ut. '
Och… I-förmiddag som en grabb vem är sorterar constantly av rinnande dum statistik i his varar besvärad, vet du? Jag betyder ska att ljus ändring, för jag räknar till 10? Och vad är oddsna av som min gör något, för den första snowen flyger, eller du vet, det sorterar av ting.
Så vad är, var förmiddagen för odds som I går att komma ut ur detta vid liv självfallet stor. Och på det peka, mig figurerade fem procent, därför att lägre var för deprimerande. Men ”är vi al-Qaeda”, och där därefter, börjar Peter, alla dina beräkningar tidigare.
Så är de al-Qaeda, och är vad UNNA som går att göra vis-a-vis al-Qaeda? Vad går regeringen av Kanada att göra vis-a-vis al-Qaeda? Är vad västra gå att göra?
MANSBRIDGE: Önskade de dig, därför att du var UN, eller därför att du var kanadensisk?
FOWLER: UN.
MANSBRIDGE: Utfärdade kanadensare kommet upp alls?
FOWLER: Nr.en I-funderare var det en ökad bonus för dem. Men dem - men I-all funderare denna går tillbaka till deras beskickning, och huruvida eller vi inte var en uppsätta som mål av tillfället eller en riktad beskickning. Så var det en stor UN-grabb är vad, är vad de grep.
Efter ”vi har varit al-Qaeda”, och, vi är resa mer och mer - någonsin vidare norrut, och inget tvivel känsligt lågt, skadadt och inte mycket modigt, mig chauffören, frågade, är det din avsikt att utföra oss?
Jag vet inte varför jag frågade det. Inte säker förmiddag I önskade jag egentligen svaret. Men ändå. But he reacted with very satisfying anger, sort of saying 'nah'. I mean, he said: 'Listen, my mission was to capture you. If my mission had been to execute you, you'd be dead. So don't give me any more of that crap.' I mean that was the idea, which again I found a rather happy response.
MANSBRIDGE: You believed him?
FOWLER: Oh boy, that's a big question then and at any future point. I certainly wanted to believe him, so that would do for a while. Yeah.
MANSBRIDGE VOICE-OVER: The chaotic first days stretched into weeks. After 56 hours of brutal off-road driving, a trip that fractured one of Fowler's vertebrae, the hostages were shuffled from camp to camp in northern Mali. All the while, he was held at gunpoint by 20 insurgents, one as young as seven.
Camp life became routine. Fowler wore out his shoes through daily exercise, repairing them with thorns. And he secretly kept track of days by marking his leather belt.
MANSBRIDGE: Tell me about movie night.
FOWLER: As night falls they take three spare tires and pile them one on top of the other, haul out their nifty laptop, plug it into the engine, to the cigarette lighter in the engine compartment, and fire it up and we watch what we call TV night. They would have [a video view] of sniper rifles as they sort of popped the heads off GIs in Iraq and Afghanistan, endless IEDs [improvised explosive devices] blowing up Humvees, trucks and convoys in Iraq and Afghanistan. Lots of suicide bombers crashing through gates blowing up, some buildings … and every time this would happen the audience would scream and wasn't that great.
MANSBRIDGE: Every time there was a TV night they'd play the same?
FOWLER: Oh no, sometimes they had new [movies]. Al-Qaeda central would send them a new hot DVD. Actually the only time I saw real excitement was a guy running in from with a new DVD. Boy, you know we have a bestseller tonight. And they would, it was clearly these were propaganda films, rather good production values. I mean they were well made. It was to pump up the boys. I mean to remind them of what it was all about, and they were Mujahadeen and death in the calls is what it's all about and we will prevail. I eventually refused to go to TV night, but created a bit of an issue, but not a huge issue, a bit of an issue. I said I had seen the twin towers come down 400 times. I don't need to see them again.
MANSBRIDGE: Now you became featured in videos yourself?
FOWLER: Yes.
MANSBRIDGE: There were three in total?
FOWLER: Four actually.
MANSBRIDGE: Four. And now the idea initially was 'proof of life' videos?
FOWLER: Yes that's certainly what I thought. They're not all the same. But the first one we did on Day 5. We were ushered into a tent. The only time we were ever in a tent was to make videos. I didn't like tents. Every time I walked into a tent I remembered Daniel Pearl and it wasn't a good memory.
Each one was different, very different. The first one was what I kind of expected to be; it was proof of life. I'd seen the movies. I knew that that's what had to happen and I knew that that meant my family would know that I was captured and they were not going to be real happy about the al-Qaeda part of it.
I think I was suggesting to you they're not technically incompetent. I mean just a total contradiction of these guys festooned with sat phones, cell phones, GPSs, walkie-talkies, video cameras and laptops — whose minds are 15 centuries away, whose weapons are a couple of generations old, and who really wish they didn't have rifles and could get back to the days of the scimitar and saber. Strange contradictions.
Video three was very different. Somber. No backdrop when we got in there. Hands behind our back. Blindfolded for the first time. And we're told 'don't speak'. You have no speaking role. Don't speak.
And all I know of that video was I guy intoning behind me a long screed in Arabic with lots of references to al-Qaeda, Jihad, Muhjahadeen, Allah and Allahu Akhbar and blindfolds came off, we were taken out of the tent, taken back to our tree and left alone, absolutely alone. Nobody talked to us, nobody came near us.
And I did not feel happy about that. I didn't know what had happened. I guessed — and does it happen I think I guessed absolutely accurately — it was a death threat, an ultimatum.
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Роберт Fowler Abducted
Automatically translated into Russian thanks to WorldLingo
Транскрипт НОВОСТЕЙ CBC
ИСКЛЮЧИТЕЛЬНЫЙ: Дипломат интервью Роберт
Fowler канадское говорит с Питер Mansbridge о его уточненном последнем
тяжелого испытания увоза: Среда 8-ое сентябрь 2009 | 10:57 PM ET новости Роберт
Fowler Comments0Recommend6CBC talk about как он был захващен, случилось к ему в плене и как он eventualy было выпущено в исключении новостей CBC. (Новости Tom Sharina/CBC) это будет рассказ untold канадского дипломата Роберт Fowler, которое, на 130 дней earlier this year, держалось на gunpoint и под постоянн угрозой исполнения.
Для те 4 с половиной месяцев он был живущ, ел, перемещающ и спящ с al-Qaeda пока отчаянные переговоры за--мест осуществили для того чтобы попытаться освободить его и его ассистент, Луис Guay.
Following будет транскриптом интервью Питер Mansbridge с Fowler, которое проветрило вторник, cSept. 8, на соотечественнике. Будет сердц-останавливая внутренностью взгляда kidnapping организацией террориста мира опасать.
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MANSBRIDGE: Наилучшим образом, было парой месяцев теперь в виду того что тяжелое испытание закончилось. Как вы?
FOWLER: Я думаю довольно хорошо. Я как раз услышал рассказ вчера от ООН ванты приняла приблизительно тот же самое время по мере того как мы находились в Пакистане и Baluchistan. Он думал он было довольно хорошо и 5 месяцев более поздно, без любого извещения, понизились в части. Так я должен дать вам довольно немедленно и временно ответ: до тех пор, настолько хорошо.
MANSBRIDGE: Сделайте вы все же, хотя, имейте моменты ежедневные, каждую пару дней, где вас думайте его unprompted? In other words, никто спрашивает вам, вы как раз неожиданно начинаете думать о ем?
FOWLER: Я делаю. И все виды пуска вещей оно. , Возможно самый странный момент, и я поговорил к моему pal, Луис Guay, который находился в этом с мной, другой день и мы оба имеем точно такую же реакцию. Оно, оно нереально. Я намереваюсь оно случился? Было оно реально как то? Или я, am iий представляя некоторое из вещества? И после этого неожиданно, вы получите другую память которая remind вы что она была exactly like то.
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MANSBRIDGE VOICE-OVER: Bob Fowler был никаким обычным канадским дипломатом. На декады он находился на leading крае инициатив этой страны чужих. Регулярно на righthand премьер-министров, он работал его дорога вверх через часто предательские курсы канцелярщины Ottawa. Его сторонницы похвалили его для его интеллекта и участливости. Его foes увидели его как твердолобо и контролировать. После этого, в 2006, на 62, он выбыл с почетностью и accolades.
Но «выход на пенсию» не находился реально в терминологии Bob Fowler. Африка была. И оно было к материку - карьер-длинней страсти для Fowler что Организация Объединенных Наций спросило, что он пошло. Гадкий спор над минеральными ресурсами между правительством Нигерии и rebel движением MNJ как полет. Находить мир был возможностью.
Но вместо, на ленивое после полудня воскресенья just before рождество, вдоль хайвея Нигерии единственного вымощанного, как раз 30 MINUT вне столицы, мира Bob Fowler повернули в кошмар.
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FOWLER: Неожиданно будет тележка проходя нас. Мы идем реально быстрыми и он идет более быстро, и он не будет Lamborghini, он будет тележкой. Неправильно с этим изображением, вы знаете?
MANSBRIDGE: Вы знали было что-то неправильно с изображением?
FOWLER: Нет, пока. Нет, за исключением - хороше я вспоминаю - он идет мимо и немедленно ломтики через дорогу, право перед нами. Я намереваюсь whoa, я намереваюсь реально опасная, scary и наш водитель и немедленно отбрасываюсь вне для того чтобы пройти его, на этап которого он отбрасывает вне снова. После этого я знал мы находилось в тревоге.
Прежде чем мы довольно остановили… 2 ванты, африканские стороны, в задней части pickup truck вольтижируют над краем. Одна ванта вольтижирует над краем с его Kalashnikov высоко и другая ванта направляет при его Kalashnikov направляя от задней части тележки прямо на водителя, от 4 метров прочь.
MANSBRIDGE: Так вы знаете с этой точки зрения не будет сомнения случается?
FOWLER: Не будет сомнения случается, и я думать - это будет большое damn cliché всего времени - как может это случаться к мне? Я намереваюсь я тратило долговременно в Африке. Это будет безопасный 8 процентов страны. Это где посольство имеет их пикники на воскресенье. Почему? Это не право. Случается? ... Я думаю вещь приняла от от 35 до 45 секунд от начала до конца.
MANSBRIDGE: От начала…?
FOWLER: От как только я осуществил этого не a, вы знает, идиоты на дороге, этом будут something else. К наш находиться в другой тележке, forced лежать вниз под очень smelly, маслообразное одеялом с, при эти 2 ванты сидя on top of мы, автомобиль делая поворот и штриховатость 180 градусов в другом направлении. То было 45 секунд.
How well эта вещь была установлена вверх? Там будут индикации, котор оно very well было установлено вверх.
Я должен впустить, оно также очень эффективно был исполнен. Дверь задего offside была сорванные открытыми. Луис было видом после того как ономаршировало за водителем в фронте. Оба из [они] был вид быть брошенным в автомобиль в фронте. Луис было видом после того как оно сгребено через его бровь и глаз с foreside AK. Я находился на другой стороне, на внутренности. И интересовали если я, то, смогл сделать бег для его. Они сняли бы если я сделал бег для его?
Я покидал бы Луис и водителя если я сделал? By the time я артикулировал вопросы, я находился в задней части той тележки и, и мы сделали этот вид screeching 180 [поворот STEPENи]. И по мере того как я принуждался вниз, я вспоминаю пойти теперь другая дорога, посмотреть и увидеть наш автомобиль там и быть 100 процентов уверен что должно быть одна из их вант около, котор нужно перескочить в ее и управить она. Очень ценное имущество.
По мере того как мы теперь знаем, по мере того как я нашел вне только когда я get out, они налево автомобиль там, 7 часов на дороге, с 3 из своих 4 дверей раскрывают, ход двигателя и мигатель дальше.
MANSBRIDGE: Один из вопросов вид nagged некоторое о моменте захвата почему были справедливо вы, Луис Guay и водитель в корабле - и почему не было некоторого предохранения.
FOWLER: Право, yeah.
MANSBRIDGE: Вы вокруг и вы находились в старших уровнях канцелярщины и с ООН. Вы очевидно имели тренировку на этих вещах. Я appreciate что эта определенная OBLASTь несколько была учтена сейфом, но вы были бы целью профиля. Почему было никакая обеспеченность?
FOWLER: Огорченно. Оно не было - не было учтено несколько безопасно, оно было безопасно. Оно было…
MANSBRIDGE: Но оно не было.
FOWLER: Не хлынется нет, оно не было. И препятствуйте нам получите к тому.
Но канадское посольство picnicking там неделя раньше. Все правительство шло вверх по той дороге в 2 днях. Были столбы полиций вдоль дороги и она находилась в 8 процентах страны была зелена на карте обеспеченностью ООН.
Я находился в более менее безопасных обстоятельствах без предохранения. Делом с ООН, и реально с странами также, будет вы обеспеченность разрешения к стране местонахождения. И дорога, котор мы сделали бы itinerary что мы посылаем то к офису ООН в мы сказали здесь будем вещами мы хотим сделать и, над викэндом, мы хотим get out в countryside немного и мы хотим пойти к этой шахте.
[Мы] provided that к офисам ООН, ООН после этого снабубегут то правительство, и их - я угадываю из-за умозрения, вас talk about оно. Я проверил когда я получил назад и я получил emails от офиса ООН говоря да, более далее к вашему вопросу, меня могу подтвердить что мы передавали ваш itinerary к всем соотвествующим людям. Настолько не будет сомнения, котор они имели.
Я не знаю если это право, то, Питер, но я думаю я будет вероятно самой старшей тварью ООН которую они заедали.
MANSBRIDGE: Но вопрос становит: Если они знали, то они хватали, они нашли бы точно где вы.
FOWLER: Точно.
MANSBRIDGE: И другие люди знают то каждым - множество людей, я угадываю, на конце дня - который получил ООН itinerary.
FOWLER: Вы получили его.
MANSBRIDGE: И вы получаете правительство вероятно не полюбило too much вся идея почему вы были там во-первых.
FOWLER: Они ненавидели мой полет.
MANSBRIDGE: Потому что смогло только быть ценой к им in the long run. Любым делом была бы цена к им.
FOWLER: Yeah. Президент Нигерии, именем которой будет Tanja. Оно было ясно от the first time я встречал его в августе что он был обиден, после того как он надоеден, после того как он оконфужен фактом который Генеральный секретарь ООН ООН увидело пригонку для того чтобы назначить специальное envoy для его страны. В действительности, некоторое из вещества, котор я читал в виду того что я get out, при spokespeople правительства Нигерии talk about мой полет. Они сказали я должен было там увидеть если я смог получить владением illicit рукояток торгуя, то которое не был мой полет.
Мой полет должен был получить, что правительство сделал мир с повстанцами. Покуда не было мира с повстанцами, противник находился на стробе, праве? Если al-Qaeda принимает людей на окраинах города, то противник реально на стробе. И управление моделей чувства национальной безопасности, права?
Так я не знаю ходило по магазинам я. Я знаю кто-нибудь ходило по магазинам я. Было в состоянии оно быть? Было в состоянии быть правительством Нигерии. Смог быть sympathizer al-Qaeda в офисе ООН в Нигерии. В офисе ООН в западной Африке. В здании секретариата в нью-йорке. All of them имели мою повестку дня, мой itinerary.
MANSBRIDGE: Вы имеете ваш пасспорт с вами?
FOWLER: Нет, я не имел ничего, которое управляло ими шальными. Управил ими совершенно шальными. Одна ванта дала мне ад. Я намереваюсь он несознательн для того чтобы go out без ваших документов. Вы думаете вы?
MANSBRIDGE: Вы сказали им вы были?
FOWLER: Да, немедленно я сказал им которые я был, и они не были…
MANSBRIDGE: И почему вы были?
FOWLER: Нет, мы не получили в любое из того.
MANSBRIDGE: Нет, но я намереваемся когда вы сказали «я буду Роберт Fowler, я буду специальный представитель ООН. »?
FOWLER: Да.
MANSBRIDGE: Вы сказали то?
FOWLER: Я сказал то. Они спросили мне я был и я сказал то. И они были - они были unsurprised тем. И после этого Луис имело его passer laissez ООН с им, которое будет пасспортом ООН, и мое passer laissez и мой канадский пасспорт сидели в моем сейфе гостиницы.
Они приняли его вещество Луис вахту и в его кармане. Они for some reason не приняли мой недорогой перемещая вахту. Сделано для muggers.
MANSBRIDGE: Они были в состоянии сказать knockoff.
FOWLER: Yeah, то право, точно…. Так они делают это и они вроде филируют вокруг бита. И я имею момент, как раз момент, и я сказал Луис, говорю им правду. No matter what случает, скажите им правду. Вы не имеете что-нибыдь настолько важно для того чтобы защитить что оно be worth ваша жизнь.
MANSBRIDGE: Теперь почему вы сказали то?
FOWLER: Потому что я сказал если вы начинаете сказать лож, то вы получите уловленными вверх в ваших собственных стержнях и вы потеряете любую способность. Я не сказал вс то. То находилось в моем разуме.
MANSBRIDGE: Но вы говорили что потому что то будет Bob Fowler думая или вы говорили что потому что то будет тренировка вы получаете?
FOWLER: Нет, то мной думая.
MANSBRIDGE: Потому что вы должны иметь тренировку.
FOWLER: Никто всегда тренировало меня в быть заложником.
MANSBRIDGE: Реально?
FOWLER: Нет.
MANSBRIDGE: Уровни старшия что вы были на никогда после того как вы имели любой тренировке как то?
FOWLER: Нет, никогда. Но то были книгами шпионки чтения и наблюдая киноими. И возможно хорошее чувство.
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FOWLER: Где-то очень поздно, я намереваюсь 4 или 5 в утре, мы, мы остановил. Одеяло брошено на землю и мы сказаны «остальные,» и водитель get out его автомобиля, вползают под тележкой в нейтральном положении. Один из воинов отдыхает, и другое одно будет sentry на предохранителе, и он делает чай.
Новости CBC получали это изображение cellphone. Это the first time изображение Роберт Fowler в плене было сделано публикой. Я не могу лежать вниз на половике потому что моя задняя часть ушибает too much. И я после этого гуляю к этой ванте и он crouched над этим малюсеньким пожаром, делающ его чай и его смотрите вверх и говорите, вы вычислял вне мы пока? И I очень предварительно и без осуждения на совсем после того как я сказан наилучшим образом, я намереваюсь буду вами MNJ? И он дает мне пренебрежительный взгляд и говорит, in effect, меня намеревается I делало бы висеть вокруг с теми индюками, вы знает? Я буду Senegalese. Я не имею ничего сделать с политикой Нигерии.
Он не сказал вс то, он как раз сказал «я буду Senegalese». И я сказал «oh». И после этого он говорит: 'Мы будем al-Qaeda. И дно моего мира упало вне. '
И… я буду вантой будет постоянн видом бежать тупоумные статистик в его разуме, вы знаю? Я намереваюсь буду что изменение света прежде чем я подсчитываю до 10? И будут форами моего делая что-то прежде чем первый снежок летает или вы знаете, тот вид вещи.
Так будут форы я идет come out of это живое было очевидно большое одно. И на тот этап, я вычислял 5 процентов потому что низко слишком отжал. Но «мы будем al-Qaeda», и там после этого, Питер, начинает все ваши вычисления более раньше.
Так они будет al-Qaeda, и будет ООН идя сделать vis-a-vis al-Qaeda? Правительство Канады идет сделать vis-a-vis al-Qaeda? Запад идет сделать?
MANSBRIDGE: Они хотели вас потому что вы были ООН или потому что вы были канадски?
FOWLER: ООН.
MANSBRIDGE: Канадский вопрос come up на всех?
FOWLER: Нет, я думаю было добавленной тантьемой для их. Но они - но я думаю это все идет back to их полет и были ли или не мы целью возможности или пристрелнным полетом. Так это было большой вантой ООН, они схватило.
После того как «мы al-Qaeda», и мы перемещающ больше и больше - всегда продвиньте northward, и никак сомнение чувствовать низко, после того как я повреждено и очень отважно, я спросило водителя, будет вашим намерием исполнить нас?
Я не знаю почему я спросил то. Я не уверен я реально хотел ответ. Но однако. But he reacted with very satisfying anger, sort of saying 'nah'. I mean, he said: 'Listen, my mission was to capture you. If my mission had been to execute you, you'd be dead. So don't give me any more of that crap.' I mean that was the idea, which again I found a rather happy response.
MANSBRIDGE: You believed him?
FOWLER: Oh boy, that's a big question then and at any future point. I certainly wanted to believe him, so that would do for a while. Yeah.
MANSBRIDGE VOICE-OVER: The chaotic first days stretched into weeks. After 56 hours of brutal off-road driving, a trip that fractured one of Fowler's vertebrae, the hostages were shuffled from camp to camp in northern Mali. All the while, he was held at gunpoint by 20 insurgents, one as young as seven.
Camp life became routine. Fowler wore out his shoes through daily exercise, repairing them with thorns. And he secretly kept track of days by marking his leather belt.
MANSBRIDGE: Tell me about movie night.
FOWLER: As night falls they take three spare tires and pile them one on top of the other, haul out their nifty laptop, plug it into the engine, to the cigarette lighter in the engine compartment, and fire it up and we watch what we call TV night. They would have [a video view] of sniper rifles as they sort of popped the heads off GIs in Iraq and Afghanistan, endless IEDs [improvised explosive devices] blowing up Humvees, trucks and convoys in Iraq and Afghanistan. Lots of suicide bombers crashing through gates blowing up, some buildings … and every time this would happen the audience would scream and wasn't that great.
MANSBRIDGE: Every time there was a TV night they'd play the same?
FOWLER: Oh no, sometimes they had new [movies]. Al-Qaeda central would send them a new hot DVD. Actually the only time I saw real excitement was a guy running in from with a new DVD. Boy, you know we have a bestseller tonight. And they would, it was clearly these were propaganda films, rather good production values. I mean they were well made. It was to pump up the boys. I mean to remind them of what it was all about, and they were Mujahadeen and death in the calls is what it's all about and we will prevail. I eventually refused to go to TV night, but created a bit of an issue, but not a huge issue, a bit of an issue. I said I had seen the twin towers come down 400 times. I don't need to see them again.
MANSBRIDGE: Now you became featured in videos yourself?
FOWLER: Yes.
MANSBRIDGE: There were three in total?
FOWLER: Four actually.
MANSBRIDGE: Four. And now the idea initially was 'proof of life' videos?
FOWLER: Yes that's certainly what I thought. They're not all the same. But the first one we did on Day 5. We were ushered into a tent. The only time we were ever in a tent was to make videos. I didn't like tents. Every time I walked into a tent I remembered Daniel Pearl and it wasn't a good memory.
Each one was different, very different. The first one was what I kind of expected to be; it was proof of life. I'd seen the movies. I knew that that's what had to happen and I knew that that meant my family would know that I was captured and they were not going to be real happy about the al-Qaeda part of it.
I think I was suggesting to you they're not technically incompetent. I mean just a total contradiction of these guys festooned with sat phones, cell phones, GPSs, walkie-talkies, video cameras and laptops — whose minds are 15 centuries away, whose weapons are a couple of generations old, and who really wish they didn't have rifles and could get back to the days of the scimitar and saber. Strange contradictions.
Video three was very different. Somber. No backdrop when we got in there. Hands behind our back. Blindfolded for the first time. And we're told 'don't speak'. You have no speaking role. Don't speak.
And all I know of that video was I guy intoning behind me a long screed in Arabic with lots of references to al-Qaeda, Jihad, Muhjahadeen, Allah and Allahu Akhbar and blindfolds came off, we were taken out of the tent, taken back to our tree and left alone, absolutely alone. Nobody talked to us, nobody came near us.
And I did not feel happy about that. I didn't know what had happened. I guessed — and does it happen I think I guessed absolutely accurately — it was a death threat, an ultimatum.
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Robert Fowler Abducted
Automatically translated into Dutch thanks to WorldLingo
Het EXCLUSIEVE Afschrift van het NIEUWS
CBC: Spreekt de het gespreks Canadese
diplomaat van Robert Fowler met Peter Mansbridge over zijn Laatst bijgewerkt
Van de abductiebeproeving: Dinsdag, 8 September, 2009 | 10:57 PM ET van Robert Fowler
van het Nieuws Comments0Recommend6CBC besprekingen over hoe hij werd gevangen, wat aan hem in gevangenschap gebeurde en hoe hij eventualy in exclusief Nieuws een CBC werd bevrijd. (Tom Sharina/CBC News) dit is het untold verhaal van Canadese diplomaat Robert Fowler, die, 130 dagen vroeger op het jaar, onder schot en onder constante bedreiging van uitvoering werd gehouden.
Voor die vier en een half maanden leefde hij, at, reiste en sliep met al-Qaeda terwijl de wanhopige achter-de-scènesonderhandelingen plaatsvonden om vrij te proberen hem en zijn medewerker, Louis Guay.
Het volgende is een afschrift van Peter Mansbridge's gesprek met Fowler, dat Dinsdag, Sept. luchtte. 8, op de Ingezetene. Het is hart-tegenhoudt kijkt binnen een ontvoering door de meest gevreesde de terroristenorganisatie van de wereld.
MANSBRIDGE: Goed, is het nu een paar maanden geweest aangezien de beproeving beëindigde. Hoe bent u?
FOWLER: Ik denk vrij goed. Ik hoorde gisteren enkel een verhaal van de V.N. van een kerel die over de zelfde tijd werden genomen die wij in Pakistan en Baluchistan waren. Hij dacht hij vrij goed was en vijf later maanden, zonder enig bericht, in stukken viel. Zo moet ik u een eerder direct en tijdelijk antwoord geven: tot dusver, zo goed.
MANSBRIDGE: Hebt unprompted u toch, niettemin, ogenblikken elke dag, elk paar van dagen, waar u denkt aan het? Met andere woorden, vraagt niemand u, begint u enkel plotseling over het te denken?
FOWLER: Ik. En allerlei dingentrekker het. , Misschien het vreemdste ogenblik, en ik sprak aan mijn pal, Louis Guay, die in dit met me was, de andere dag en wij allebei hebben precies de zelfde reactie. Het is, is het onwerkelijk. Ik beteken het gebeurde? Was het werkelijk als dat? Ben of I, ben I veronderstellend enkele materiaal? En dan plotseling, zult u een ander geheugen krijgen dat u eraan zal herinneren dat het net zoals dat was.
MANSBRIDGE COMMENTAARSTEM: Fowler van het loodje was geen gewone Canadese diplomaat. Voor decennia was hij op de voorrand van de buitenlandse initiatieven van dit land. Regelmatig bij rechts van eerste ministers, had hij zijn manier omhoog door de vaak verraderlijke wegen van de bureaucratie van Ottawa gewerkt. Zijn verdedigers prijsten hem voor zijn intellect en medeleven. Zijn vijanden zagen hem koppig en controlerend. Dan, in 2006, bij 62, trok hij zich met eer en accolades terug.
Maar de „pensionering“ was niet werkelijk in Fowler van het Loodje woordenschat. Afrika was. En het was aan het continent - een carrière-lange hartstocht voor Fowler - dat de Verenigde Naties hem om vroegen te gaan. Een smerig geschil over delfstoffen tussen de regering van Niger en de rebellenbeweging MNJ als opdracht. Het vinden van vrede was de uitdaging.
Maar in plaats daarvan, op een luie Zondag middag vlak vóór Kerstmis, langs de enige bedekte weg van Niger, enkel 30 minuten buiten het kapitaal, Fowler van het Loodje werd de wereld nightmare.
FOWLER: Plotseling is er een vrachtwagen die ons overgaat. Wij gaan werkelijk snel en hij gaat sneller, en hij is geen Lamborghini, is hij een vrachtwagen. Wat verkeerd is met dit beeld, weet u het?
MANSBRIDGE: U wist er iets verkeerd met het beeld waren?
FOWLER: Nr, nog niet. Nr, behalve - me goed herinner ik - hij gaat en onmiddellijk voorbij plakken over de weg, recht voor ons. Ik bedoel whoa, bedoel ik werkelijk gevaarlijk, eng en onze bestuurder en slinger onmiddellijk uit om hem over te gaan, op welk punt dat hij uit opnieuw heeft geslingerd. Dan wist ik wij in probleem waren.
Alvorens wij vrij opgehouden… hadden de twee kerels, Afrikaanse gezichten, in de rug van de bestelwagenvrachtwagen zijn vaulting over de rand. Één kerel is vaulting over de rand met zijn hoge Kalashnikov en de andere kerel streeft met zijn Kalashnikov rechtstreeks strevend van de rug van de vrachtwagen naar de bestuurder, van vier meter weg.
MANSBRIDGE: Zo weet u op dit punt er zonder twijfel zijn wat gebeurt?
FOWLER: Er zijn zonder twijfel wat gebeurt, en denk ik - dit is de grootste vloek cliché van al tijd - hoe kan dit aan me gebeuren? Ik beteken ik heel wat tijd in Afrika heb besteed. Dit is het veilige acht percent van het land. Dit is waar de ambassade hun picknicks op Zondag heeft. Waarom? Dit is niet juist. Wat gebeurt? ... Ik denk het ding uit 35 tot 45 seconden van het beginnen te beëindigen nam.
MANSBRIDGE: Van bij het begin…?
FOWLER: Van zodra ik realiseerde is dit geen a, weet u het, idioten op de weg, is dit iets anders. Aan onze het zijn in de andere vrachtwagen, die wordt gedwongen om onder een zeer smelly, olieachtige deken te liggen met, met deze twee kerels die bovenop ons zitten, de auto die een 180 graaddraai en strook in de andere richting heeft gedaan. Dat was 45 seconden.
Hoe goed werd dit ding opgezet? Er daar zijn aanwijzingen het zeer goed werd opgezet.
Ik moet toelaten, werd het ook zeer efficiënt uitgevoerd. De offside achterdeur was gescheurde open. Louis was soort van kikker-gemarcheerd achter de bestuurder vooraan. Allebei van [hen] waren soort van wordt geworpen in de auto vooraan. Louis was soort van geharkt over zijn wenkbrauw en oog met foreside van een AK. Ik was aan de andere kant, op de binnenkant. En benieuwd geweest of zou ik, kon een looppas voor het moeten maken. Zouden zij ontspruiten als ik een looppas voor het maakte?
Zou ik Louis en de bestuurder verlaten als ik? Tegen de tijd dat ik de vragen had gearticuleerd, was ik in de rug van die vrachtwagen en, en wij deden dit soort van het screeching van 180 [graaddraai]. En aangezien ik neer werd gedwongen, herinner ik gaand nu de andere manier, kijkend en ziend onze auto daar en op het punt staand 100 percenten bepaald dat er één van hun kerels zou moeten zijn in het te springen en het terug te drijven. Zeer waardevolle activa.
Zoals wij nu het weten, aangezien ik te weten kwam slechts toen ik wegging, verlieten zij de auto daar, zeven uren op de weg, met drie van zijn vier open deuren, motor het lopen en de oogklep.
MANSBRIDGE: Één van de vragen de soort waarvan heeft nagged wat over het ogenblik van vangst is waarom er enkel u waren, Louis Guay en de bestuurder in het voertuig - en waarom er niet wat bescherming was.
FOWLER: Recht, ja.
MANSBRIDGE: U bent rond geweest en u bent in hogere niveaus van de bureaucratie en met de V.N. geweest. U hebt duidelijk opleiding op deze dingen gehad. Ik waardeer dat dit bepaalde gebied als veilig enigszins beschouwd was, maar u zou een profieldoel geweest zijn. Waarom was er geen veiligheid?
FOWLER: Droevig. Het was niet - het werd niet beschouwd als enigszins veilig, was het veilig. Het was…
MANSBRIDGE: Maar het was niet.
FOWLER: Goed was nr, het niet. En krijg aan dat.
Maar de Canadese Ambassade picnicking daar de voordien week. De volledige overheid ging die weg in twee dagen uit. Er waren politieposten langs de weg en het was in het acht percent van het land dat op de de veiligheidskaart van de V.N. groen was.
Ik ben in minder veilige omstandigheden zonder bescherming geweest. Behandel de V.N., en werkelijk met landen eveneens, is u overlaten veiligheid aan het gastheerland. En de manier wij de reisroute zouden doen is dat wij dat naar het bureau verzenden van de V.N. waarin wij zeiden hier de dingen zijn die wij hebben willen om doen en, tijdens het weekend, wij in het platteland een klein beetje willen weggaan en wij naar deze mijn willen gaan.
[Wij] op voorwaarde dat aan de bureaus van de V.N., de V.N. dan dat aan de overheid, en zij bepalen - ik veronderstel wegens de speculatie, sprak u over het. Ik controleerde toen ik terugkeerde en ik e-mail van het bureau van de V.N. ja zeggend, verder aan uw vraag kreeg, kan ik bevestigen dat wij uw reisroute tot alle aangewezen mensen hebben overgegaan. Zo er zijn zonder twijfel zij had.
Ik weet niet of is dit juist, Peter, maar ik denk ik waarschijnlijk het meest hogere schepsel ben van de V.N. dat zij hebben gegrepen.
MANSBRIDGE: Maar de kwestie wordt: Als zij wisten wie zij grepen, zouden zij precies vinden waar u bent.
FOWLER: Precies.
MANSBRIDGE: En de andere mensen die dat kennen zijn iedereen - heel wat mensen, veronderstel ik, begin de dag - die de reisroute van de V.N. kreeg.
FOWLER: U kreeg het.
MANSBRIDGE: En u hebt een overheid die waarschijnlijk niet teveel van het gehele idee hield van waarom u daar in de eerste plaats was.
FOWLER: Zij haatten mijn opdracht.
MANSBRIDGE: Omdat het slechts uiteindelijk kosten kon zijn aan hen. Om het even welke overeenkomst zou kosten aan hen zijn.
FOWLER: Ja. De president van Niger, de van wie naam Tanja is. Het was duidelijk van de eerste keer ik hem in Augustus ontmoette dat hij beledigd was, geërgerdw, pijnlijk door het feit dat de secretaris-generaal van de V.N. pasvorm een speciale gezant voor zijn land had zien benoemen. In feite, enkele materiaal dat ik aangezien ik wegging, met de overheid van Niger spokespeople sprekend over mijn opdracht heb gelezen. Zij zeiden ik daar moest zien of kon ik greep krijgen van het ongeoorloofde wapens handel drijven, die niet mijn opdracht was.
Mijn opdracht moest de overheid ertoe brengen om vrede met de rebellen te maken. Zolang er geen vrede met de rebellen was, was de vijand bij de poort, recht? Als al-Qaeda mensen op de rand van de stad neemt, de vijand werkelijk bij de poort. En het bestuur van nationale veiligheid houdt, recht steek?
Zo weet ik wie niet me winkelde. Ik weet somebody me winkelde. Who kon het zijn? Het zou de regering van Niger kunnen zijn. Een sympathisant al-Qaeda in het bureau van de V.N. in Niger zou kunnen zijn. In het bureau van de V.N. in West-Afrika. In het secretariaatsgebouw in New York. Allemaal hadden mijn agenda, mijn reisroute.
MANSBRIDGE: Had u uw paspoort met u?
FOWLER: Nr, had ik niets, die gek hen dreef. Dreef absoluut gek hen. Één kerel gaf me hel. Ik beteken het onverantwoordelijk om zonder uw documenten is uit te gaan. Who denkt u u bent?
MANSBRIDGE: Vertelde u hen die u was?
FOWLER: Ja, onmiddellijk vertelde ik hen die ik was, en zij waren niet…
MANSBRIDGE: En waarom u daar was?
FOWLER: Nr, kregen wij niet in om het even welk van dat.
MANSBRIDGE: Nr, maar ik bedoel toen u zei „ik Robert Fowler ben, ben ik de speciale vertegenwoordiger van de V.N. “?
FOWLER: Ja.
MANSBRIDGE: U zei dat?
FOWLER: Ik zei dat. Zij vroegen me die ik was en ik zei dat. En zij waren - zij waren unsurprised door dat. En toen had Louis zijn V.N.- vrijgeleide met hem, dat het paspoort van de V.N. is, en mijn vrijgeleide en mijn Canadees paspoort zaten in mijn hotelbrandkast.
Zij namen Louis horloge en zijn materiaal in zijn zak. Zij met een bepaalde bedoeling namen mijn goedkoop reizend horloge niet. Gemaakt voor muggers.
MANSBRIDGE: Zij konden een knockoff vertellen.
FOWLER: Ja, is dat juist, precies…. Dat doen zij dit en zij zijn vriendelijk van malen rond een beetje. En ik heb een ogenblik, enkel een ogenblik, en ik zei Louis, vertel hen de waarheid. Geen kwestie wat gebeurt, vertelt hen de waarheid. U hebt om het even wat niet die zo belangrijk om is te beschermen dat het uw leven waard is.
MANSBRIDGE: Nu waarom zei u dat?
FOWLER: Omdat ik als u begint te vertellen lig zei, zult u ingehaald in uw eigen Web worden en u zult om het even welke capaciteit verliezen. Ik zei dat alles niet. Dat is wat in mijn mening was.
MANSBRIDGE: Waren maar u die zeggen dat omdat dat Fowler is van het Loodje denkend of u zeggen die was dat omdat dat is de opleiding u krijgt?
FOWLER: Nr, dat me die is denkt.
MANSBRIDGE: Omdat u opleiding moet gehad hebben.
FOWLER: Niemand ooit opgeleid me in het zijn een gijzelaar.
MANSBRIDGE: Werkelijk?
FOWLER: Nr.
MANSBRIDGE: De hogere niveaus dat u bij nooit was hadden om het even welke opleiding als dat?
FOWLER: Nr, nooit. Maar dat las spionboeken en lette op movies. En misschien goede betekenis.
FOWLER: Ergens zeer laat, bedoel ik vier of vijf in de ochtend, hielden wij, wij op. Een deken wordt ter plaatse geworpen en wij worden verteld de „rust,“ en de bestuurder uit zijn auto, kruipen onder de vrachtwagen aan rust krijgen. Één van de militairenrest, en ander één zijn de schildwacht op wacht, en hij maakt thee.
Het Nieuws CBC heeft dit cellphonebeeld verkregen. Dit is de eerste keer een beeld van Robert Fowler in gevangenschap openbaar is gemaakt. Ik kan niet op de deken liggen omdat mijn rug teveel kwetst. En ik loop dan naar deze kerel en heeft hij over deze uiterst kleine brand gebogen, die maakt zijn thee en hij omhooggaand en kijkt zegt u, berekend nog wie wij zijn? En I zeer voorlopig en zonder overtuiging bij goed bovengenoemd allen, beteken ik u MNJ bent? En hij geeft me een minachtende blik en zegt, inderdaad, ik bedoelt wat ik het hangen rond met die kalkoenen zou doen, weet u het? Ik ben Senegalees. Ik heb niets met de politiek van Niger te doen.
Hij zei dat alles niet, zei hij enkel „ik“ Senegalees ben. En ik zei „oh“. En dan zegt hij: 'Wij zijn al-Qaeda. En de bodem van mijn wereld viel uit. '
En… Ik ben een kerel die constant soort runnen van stomme statistieken in zijn mening, is weet u het? Ik beteken zal die lichte verandering alvorens ik aan 10 tel? En wat de kansen van mijn het doen iets vóór de eerste sneeuwvliegen zijn of u weet het, die soort ding.
Zo wat de kansen zijn ik uit dit levend ga komen was duidelijk grote. En op dat punt, figuur ik vijf percenten omdat lager ook indrukkend was. Maar „wij zijn al-Qaeda“, en daar toen, begint Peter, vroeger met al uw berekeningen.
Zo zijn zij al-Qaeda, en wat is de V.N. die vis-à-vis al-Qaeda gaan doen? Wat gaat de regering van Canada vis-à-vis al-Qaeda doen? Wat gaat het Westen doen?
MANSBRIDGE: Wilden zij u omdat u de V.N. was of omdat u Canadees was?
FOWLER: De V.N.
MANSBRIDGE: Kwam de Canadese kwestie omhoog bij allen?
FOWLER: Nr, denk ik het een toegevoegde bonus voor hen was. Maar zij - maar ik denk dit allen aan hun opdracht teruggaat en al dan niet wij een doel van kans of een gerichte opdracht waren. Zo was het een grote kerel van de V.N. is wat, is wat zij grepen.
Na „wij zijn al-Qaeda“, en reizen wij meer en meer - ooit verdere northward, en zonder twijfel het voelen laag, beschadigd en niet zeer moedig, ik de bestuurder, is vroeg het uw bedoeling om ons uit te voeren?
Ik weet niet waarom ik dat vroeg. Ik ben niet zeker ik werkelijk het antwoord wilde. Maar niettemin. But he reacted with very satisfying anger, sort of saying 'nah'. I mean, he said: 'Listen, my mission was to capture you. If my mission had been to execute you, you'd be dead. So don't give me any more of that crap.' I mean that was the idea, which again I found a rather happy response.
MANSBRIDGE: You believed him?
FOWLER: Oh boy, that's a big question then and at any future point. I certainly wanted to believe him, so that would do for a while. Yeah.
MANSBRIDGE VOICE-OVER: The chaotic first days stretched into weeks. After 56 hours of brutal off-road driving, a trip that fractured one of Fowler's vertebrae, the hostages were shuffled from camp to camp in northern Mali. All the while, he was held at gunpoint by 20 insurgents, one as young as seven.
Camp life became routine. Fowler wore out his shoes through daily exercise, repairing them with thorns. And he secretly kept track of days by marking his leather belt.
MANSBRIDGE: Tell me about movie night.
FOWLER: As night falls they take three spare tires and pile them one on top of the other, haul out their nifty laptop, plug it into the engine, to the cigarette lighter in the engine compartment, and fire it up and we watch what we call TV night. They would have [a video view] of sniper rifles as they sort of popped the heads off GIs in Iraq and Afghanistan, endless IEDs [improvised explosive devices] blowing up Humvees, trucks and convoys in Iraq and Afghanistan. Lots of suicide bombers crashing through gates blowing up, some buildings … and every time this would happen the audience would scream and wasn't that great.
MANSBRIDGE: Every time there was a TV night they'd play the same?
FOWLER: Oh no, sometimes they had new [movies]. Al-Qaeda central would send them a new hot DVD. Actually the only time I saw real excitement was a guy running in from with a new DVD. Boy, you know we have a bestseller tonight. And they would, it was clearly these were propaganda films, rather good production values. I mean they were well made. It was to pump up the boys. I mean to remind them of what it was all about, and they were Mujahadeen and death in the calls is what it's all about and we will prevail. I eventually refused to go to TV night, but created a bit of an issue, but not a huge issue, a bit of an issue. I said I had seen the twin towers come down 400 times. I don't need to see them again.
MANSBRIDGE: Now you became featured in videos yourself?
FOWLER: Yes.
MANSBRIDGE: There were three in total?
FOWLER: Four actually.
MANSBRIDGE: Four. And now the idea initially was 'proof of life' videos?
FOWLER: Yes that's certainly what I thought. They're not all the same. But the first one we did on Day 5. We were ushered into a tent. The only time we were ever in a tent was to make videos. I didn't like tents. Every time I walked into a tent I remembered Daniel Pearl and it wasn't a good memory.
Each one was different, very different. The first one was what I kind of expected to be; it was proof of life. I'd seen the movies. I knew that that's what had to happen and I knew that that meant my family would know that I was captured and they were not going to be real happy about the al-Qaeda part of it.
I think I was suggesting to you they're not technically incompetent. I mean just a total contradiction of these guys festooned with sat phones, cell phones, GPSs, walkie-talkies, video cameras and laptops — whose minds are 15 centuries away, whose weapons are a couple of generations old, and who really wish they didn't have rifles and could get back to the days of the scimitar and saber. Strange contradictions.
Video three was very different. Somber. No backdrop when we got in there. Hands behind our back. Blindfolded for the first time. And we're told 'don't speak'. You have no speaking role. Don't speak.
And all I know of that video was I guy intoning behind me a long screed in Arabic with lots of references to al-Qaeda, Jihad, Muhjahadeen, Allah and Allahu Akhbar and blindfolds came off, we were taken out of the tent, taken back to our tree and left alone, absolutely alone. Nobody talked to us, nobody came near us.
And I did not feel happy about that. I didn't know what had happened. I guessed — and does it happen I think I guessed absolutely accurately — it was a death threat, an ultimatum.
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روبرت فاولر يخطف
Automatically translated into Arabic thanks to WorldLingo
[كبك] أخبار نسخة حصريّة
: روبرت فاولر مقابلة
يتكلّم ديبلوماسيّة كنديّة مع بيتر [منسبريدج] حول ه اختطاف محاكمة تعذيب
أخرى يحدّث: يوم الثلاثاء, سبتمبر - أيلول 8, 2009 | [تلك بووت] 10:57 بعد الظّهر [إت] [كمّنتس0ركمّند6كبك] أخبار
روبرت فاولر كيف هو كان على قبض, ماذا حدث إلى ه في عمليّة أسر وكيف هو كان [إفنتثلي] أطلقت في [كبك] أخبار عدد استثنائيّ. (توم [شرين/كبك] أخبار) هذا ال [أونتولد] قصة من ديبلوماسيّة كنديّة روبرت فاولر, الذي, ل 130 أيام [إرلير ثيس ر], كان أمسكت في مقدمة البندقيّة وتحت تهديد ثابتة تنفيذ.
ل أنّ أربعة ونصف شهور كان هو يعيش, يأكل, يسافر وينام مع [أل-قدا] بينما يائسة [بهيند-ث-سنس] مفاوضات تمّوا أن يحاول أن يحرّر ه ومساعدته, [لوويس] [غي].
التالي نسخة من بيتر [منسبريدج] مقابلة مع فاولر, أيّ هوّى يوم الثلاثاء, [سبت.]. 8, على المواطنة. هو [هرت-ستوبّينغ] نظرة داخل [ا] إختطاف بالعالم أكثر يخشى إرهابية تنظيم.
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[منسبريدج]: جيّدا, قد كان هو زوج الشهور الآن بما أنّ المحاكمة تعذيب أنهى. كيف تكون أنت?
فاولر: أنا أفكّر [برتّي غود]. أنا فقط سمعت قصة بالأمس من المنظّمة الأمم المتّحدة من شدادة الذي كان أخذت وقت [أبووت ث سم] بما أنّ نحن كنّا في باكستان و [بلوشستن]. هو فكّر كان هو [برتّي غود] وخمسة شهور فيما بعد, دون أيّ إشعار, [فلّ] داخل قطعات. هكذا أنا يضطرّ أعطيت أنت بالأحرى فوريّة وجوابة مؤقّتة: [س فر], هكذا جيّدة.
[منسبريدج]: يتمّ أنت بعد [, ثوو], يتلقّى أعزام يوميّة, كلّ زوج الأيام, أين أنت يفكّر من هو [أونبرومبتد]? [إين وثر ووردس,] يسأل لا أحد أنت, أنت فقط فجأة تبدأ يفكّر حول هو?
فاولر: أنا أتمّ. وكلّ أنواع من أشياء زناد هو. تحدّث ال, ربّما العزم غريبة, وأنا كان إلى صديقتي, [لوويس] [غي], الذي كان في هذا مع ي, الأخرى يوم ونحن كلا نتلقّى تماما ال نفسه ردّ فعل. هو, هو غيرحقيقي. أنا أعني هو حدث? كان هو حقّا مثل أنّ? أو أكون أنا, قبل الظّهر [إي] يتخيّل بعض من المادّة خام? وبعد ذلك فجأة, سيحصل أنت آخر ذاكرة أنّ سيذكّر أنت أنّ هو كان [إإكسكتلي ليك] أنّ.
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[منسبريدج] [فويس-وفر]: كان [بوب] فاولر ما من ديبلوماسيّة عاديّة كنديّة. لعقود كان هو على الحافة رئيسيّة من هذا بلد مبادرات أجنبيّة. بانتظام في ال [ريغثند] الرئيس وزراء, كان هو قد عمل طريقه نحو الأعلى من خلال الممرات خائنة غالبا من أوتاوا ديوانيّة. مدحه مؤيداته ل ه عقل وشفقة. رأى عدواته ه بما أنّ استعصى ويضبط. بعد ذلك, في 2006, في 62, تقاعد هو مع شرف وأوسمة.
غير أنّ "[ب] تقاعد" لم حقّا في [بوب] فاولر مفردة. إفريقيا كان. وكان هو إلى القارّ - عاطفة [كرير-لونغ] لفاولر [- ثت] الالأمم المتّحدة سألواه أن يذهب. مقرفة مجادلة على [مينرل رسورس] بين الحكومة نيجر والحركة متمرّدة [منج] كالمهمة. كان يجد سلام التحدي.
غير أنّ بدلا من ذلك, على كسولة يوم الأحد العصر [جوست بفور] عيد ميلاد المسيح, على طول نيجر وحيد يرصف طريق عامّ, فقط 30 التفت دقائق خارج الرأس مال, [بوب] فاولر عالم داخل كابوس.
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فاولر: فجأة هناك شاحنة يمرّنا. نحن نذهب حقّا سريعة ويذهب هو [فستر], وهو ليس [لمبورغيني], هو شاحنة. ماذا يكون خاطئة مع هذا صورة, أنت تعرف?
[منسبريدج]: أنت عرفت كان هناك شيء على نحو خاطئ مع الصورة?
فاولر: رفض, لا بعد. رفض, ماعدا - جيّدة يتذكّر أنا - هو يذهب جانبا وفورا شريحة عبر الطريق, حق أمام نا. أنا أعني [وهوأ], أنا يعني حقّا خطرة, مريعة وسائقتنا وفورا يترجّح خارجا أن يمرّه, [وهيش بوينت] هو يترجّح خارجا ثانية. بعد ذلك عرف أنا نحن كنّا في اضطراب.
قبل أن توقّف نحن تلقّى الى حدّ بعيد… [فولتينغ] الاثنان شدادات, وجوه [أفريكن], في الظهر من الشاحنة صغيرة على الحافة. [فولتينغ] واحدة شدادة على الحافة مع [كلشنيكوف] ه عاليا والأخرى شدادة يهدف مع [كلشنيكوف] ه يهدف من الظهر من الشاحنة رأسا في السائقة, من أربعة أمتار بعيدا.
[منسبريدج]: هكذا يعرف أنت [أت ثيس بوينت] هناك ما من شك ماذا يكون يحدث?
فاولر: هناك ما من شك ماذا يكون يحدث, وأنا فكّرت - هذا يكون ال [كليش] عظيمة ملعونة من كلّ وقت - كيف يستطيع هذا كنت حدثت إلى ي? أنا أعني قد أنفق أنا [ا لوت وف تيم] في إفريقيا. هذا الآمنة ثمانية نسبة مئويّة من البلد. هذا حيث السفارة يتلقّى نزههم في يوم الأحد. لماذا? هذا ليس يصحّ. ماذا يكون يحدث? ... أنا أفكّر أخذ الشيء [فروم] 35 [تو] 45 ثانية من يبدأ إلى نهاية.
[منسبريدج]: من البداية…?
فاولر: من [أس سون س] حقّق أنا هذا ليس [ا], أنت يعرف, حمق على الطريق, هذا [سمثينغ لس]. إلى نا يكون في الأخرى شاحنة, قسريّة أن يكذب إلى أسفل تحت جدّا كريه رائحة, غطاء زيتيّة مع, مع هذا اثنان شدادات يجلس [أن توب وف] نا, السيارة يتلقّى يتمّ [180-دغر] دورة وخطّ في الأخرى اتّجاه. أنّ كان 45 ثانية.
[هوو ولّ] كان هذا شيء ثبتت فوق? هناك هناك دلالة هو كان [فري ولّ] ثبتت فوق.
أنا يضطرّ اعترفت, هو كان أيضا جدّا بفعّاليّة نفّذت. كان الباب خلفيّة [أفّسد] يمزّق مفتوحة. كان [لوويس] كان نوع من [فروغ-مرشد] خلف السائقة في جبهة. كان كلا من [هم] نوع من يكون يرمى داخل السيارة في جبهة. [لوويس] كان نوع من يدمّ عبر ه حاجب وعين مع ال [فورسد] من [أك]. أنا كنت على الأخرى جانب, على الداخل. ويتساءل إن أنا سوفت, استطاع جعلت شوط ل هو. هم قذفوا إن أنا جعلت شوط ل هو?
أنا كنت عن تخلّى [لوويس] والسائقة إن أنا أتمّت? [بي ث تيم] كان أنا قد مفصلت الأسئلة, أنا كنت في الظهر من أنّ شاحنة و, ونحن أتمّنا هذا نوع من [سكريشنغ] 180 [درجة دورة]. وبما أنّ أنا كان يكون أجبرت إلى أسفل, يتذكّر أنا يذهب الآن الأخرى طريق, ينظر ويرى سيارتنا هناك ويكون 100 نسبة مئويّة مؤكّدة أنّ هناك سوفت كنت واحدة من شداداتهم حوالي أن ييقفز داخل هو وقدت هو باتّجاه آخر. [فلوبل سّت] جدّا.
بما أنّ نحن الآن نعرف, بما أنّ أنا أسّست خارجا فقط عندما أنا طلعت, يفتح هم يسارا السيارة هناك, سبعة ساعات على الطريق, مع ثلاثة من ه أربعة أبواب, المحرك دوران والوماضة فوق.
[منسبريدج]: واحدة من الأسئلة أنّ نوع من قد [نغّد] بعض حول العزم الإعتقال لما هناك كان صحيحة أنت, [لوويس] [غي] والسائقة في العربة - ولما هناك [ب] لم بعض حماية.
فاولر: حق, أجل.
[منسبريدج]: أنت قد كنت حوالي وقد كان أنت في مستويات كبريات من الديوانيّة ومع المنظّمة الأمم المتّحدة. يتلقّى أنت يتلقّى بوضوح تدريب على هذا أشياء. أنا أقدّم أنّ اعتبرت هذا منطقة خاصّة كان نوعا ما خزينة, غير أنّ أنت كنت قطاع جانبيّ هدف. لماذا كان هناك ما من أمن?
فاولر: آسفة. هو [ب] لم - لم يعتبر هو كان نوعا ما آمنة, هو كان آمنة. هو كان…
[منسبريدج]: غير أنّ [ب] هو لم.
فاولر: ينبجس رفض, هو [ب] لم. و [لت'س] حصلت إلى أنّ.
غير أنّ [بيكنيك] السفارة كنديّة تلقّى يكون هناك الأسبوع من قبل. ذهب الحكومة كاملة كان فوق أنّ طريق في اثنان أيام. هناك كان شرطة موقعات على طول الطريق وكان هو في الثمانية نسبة مئويّة من البلد أنّ كان خضراء على المنظّمة الأمم المتّحدة أمن خريطة.
أنا قد كنت في ظروف آمنة أقلّ بلا حماية. الصفقة مع المنظّمة الأمم المتّحدة, وحقّا مع بلاد أيضا, أنت إذن أمن إلى المضيفة بلد. والطريق نحن أتمّنا المسار أنّ يرسل نحن أنّ إلى المنظّمة الأمم المتّحدة مكتب في أيّ نحن قلنا هنا يكون الأشياء نحن نريد أن يتمّ و, على النهاية أسبوع, نحن نريد أن يطلع في الريف [ا ليتّل بيت] ونحن نريد أن يذهب إلى هذا منجم لغم.
[نحن] [بروفيدد ثت] إلى المنظّمة الأمم المتّحدة مكاتب, يزوّد المنظّمة الأمم المتّحدة بعد ذلك أنّ إلى الحكومة, وهم - أنا أخمّن بسبب المضاربة, أنت [تلك بووت] هو. أنا فحصت عندما أنا حصلت إلى الخلف وأنا حصلت ال [إميلس] من المنظّمة الأمم المتّحدة مكتب يقول نعم, أبعد إلى سؤالك, أنا يستطيع أكّدت أنّ قد مرّ نحن مسارك إلى [ألّ ث] الناس مناسبة. هكذا هناك ما من شك هم تلقّوا.
أنا لا أعرف إن هذا يكون يصحّ, بيتر, غير أنّ يفكّر أنا أنا على الأرجح الكبريات منظّمة الأمم المتّحدة مخلوق أكثر أنّ هم قد على قبض.
[منسبريدج]: غير أنّ يصبح الإصدار: إن هم عرفوا الذي هم كان تلقّفوا, وجد هم تماما حيث أنت تكون.
فاولر: تماما.
[منسبريدج]: والأخرى الناس الذي يعرف أنّ كلّ واحد - [ا لوت] الالناس, يخمّن أنا, في النهاية من اليوم - الذي حصل المنظّمة الأمم المتّحدة تجواليّة.
فاولر: أنت حصلت هو.
[منسبريدج]: و [هف جت] أنت حكومة أنّ على الأرجح لم يحبّ [توو موش] الفكرة كاملة من لما أنت كنت هناك في المكان أولى.
فاولر: هم كرهوا مهمتي.
[منسبريدج]: لأنّ هو استطاع فقط كنت تكلفة إلى هم [إين ث لونغ رون]. كان أيّ صفقة تكلفة إلى هم.
فاولر: أجل. الرئيس نيجر, الذي اسم يكون [تنجا]. هو كان واضحة من [ث فيرست تيم] التقىه أنا في أغسطس - آب أنّ هو كان ضأيقت, يضأيق, يحرج بالحقيقة أنّ الأمين عامّ من المنظّمة الأمم المتّحدة كان قد رأى نوبة أن يعيّن مبعوثة خاصّة لبلده. [إين فكت], بعض من المادّة خام أنا قد قرأت بما أنّ أنا طلعت, مع نيجر حكومة متحدّث رسميّ باسم [تلك بووت] مهمتي. هم قالوا كان أنا هناك أن يرى إن أنا استطاع حصلت سيطرة من [أرمس] محظورة [ترفّيك], أيّ [ب] لم مهمتي.
كان مهمتي أن يحصل الحكومة أن يجعل سلام مع المتمردات. [أس لونغ س] كان هناك ما من سلام مع المتمردات, العدوة كان في البوابة, حق? إن [أل-قدا] يكون يأخذ الناس على الضاحيات من المدينة, العدوة حقّا في البوابة. وحكم من أمن وطنيّ صنع إحساس, حق?
هكذا لا يعرف أنا الذي تسوّق ي. أنا أعرف تسوّق واحد ما ي. الذي استطاع هو كنت? هو استطاع كنت الحكومة نيجر. استطاع كنت [أل-قدا] متعاطفة في المنظّمة الأمم المتّحدة مكتب في نيجر. في المنظّمة الأمم المتّحدة مكتب في إفريقيا غربيّة. في الأمانة سرّ بناية في نيويورك. [ألّ وف ي] تلقّى جدولي, مساري.
[منسبريدج]: أنت تلقّيت جواز سفرك مع أنت?
فاولر: رفض, تلقّى أنا لاشيء, أيّ قادهم مجنونة. قادهم إطلاقا مجنونة. أعطىني واحدة شدادة جحيم. أنا أعني هو غير مسؤول أن ينصرف دون وثائقك. الذي أنت تفكّر أنت يكون?
[منسبريدج]: أنت قلتهم الذي أنت كنت?
فاولر: نعم, فورا قالهم أنا الذي أنا كنت, وهم [ب] لم…
[منسبريدج]: ولماذا أنت كان هناك?
فاولر: رفض, لم يحصل نحن داخل أيّ من أنّ.
[منسبريدج]: يعني رفض, غير أنّ أنا عندما أنت قلت "أنا روبرت فاولر, أنا المنظّمة الأمم المتّحدة ممثلة خاصّة. "?
فاولر: نعم.
[منسبريدج]: أنت قلت أنّ?
فاولر: أنا قلت أنّ. هم سألواني الذي أنا كنت وقال أنا أنّ. وكان هم - هم كانوا [أونسوربريسد] ب أنّ. وبعد ذلك تلقّى [لوويس] ه منظّمة الأمم المتّحدة [ليسّز] [بسّر] مع ه, أيّ يكون المنظّمة الأمم المتّحدة جواز سفر, وي [ليسّز] [بسّر] وجواز سفري كنديّة كان جلس في ي فندق خزينة.
هم أخذوا [لوويس] ساعة ومادّت خامه في جيبه. لم يأخذ هم [فور سم رسن] ي رخيصة يسافر ساعة. يجعل ل [موغّر].
[منسبريدج]: هم استطاع قلت [نوكوفّ].
فاولر: أجل, أنّ يصحّ, تماما…. هكذا يتمّ هم هذا وهم نوع من يطحن حول لقمة. ويتلقّى أنا عزم, فقط عزم, وأنا قلت [لوويس], يقولهم الحقيقة. قلتهم [نو متّر وهت] يحدث, الحقيقة. أنت لا تتلقّى أيّ شيء أنّ يكون هكذا مهمّة أن يحمي أنّ [ب وورث] هو حياتك.
[منسبريدج]: الآن لما أنت قلت أنّ?
فاولر: لأنّ أنا قلت إن أنت تبدأ يقول أوضاع, سيحصل أنت يمسك فوق في ك خاصّة نساج وأنت ستخسر أيّ قدرة. أنا لم أقل كلّ أنّ. أنّ ماذا كان في عقلي.
[منسبريدج]: غير أنّ كان أنت قلت أنّ لأنّ أنّ يكون [بوب] فاولر يفكّر أو كان قال أنت أنّ لأنّ أنّ يكون التدريب أنت تحصل?
فاولر: رفض, أنّ ي يفكّر.
[منسبريدج]: لأنّ أنت ينبغي يتلقّى يتلقّى تدريب.
فاولر: درّبني [نوبود'س] في أيّ وقت في يكون رهينة.
[منسبريدج]: حقّا?
فاولر: رفض.
[منسبريدج]: الأكبر مستويات أنّ كان أنت في أبدا يتلقّى أيّ تدريب مثل أنّ?
فاولر: رفض, أبدا. غير أنّ كان أنّ قراءة جاسوس كتب ويراقب أفلام. وربّما إحساس جيّدة.
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فاولر: في مكان ما جدّا متأخّرا, يعني أنا أربعة أو خمسة في الصباح, نحن, نحن توقّف. غطاء رميت على الأرض وقلت نحن "إستراحة," والسائقة يطلع من سيارته, يزحف تحت الشاحنة إلى إستراحة. يستريح واحدة من الجنديات, والأخرى واحدة الحارسة على حارسة, وهو يجعل شاي.
[كبك] قد نال أخبار هذا [سلّفون] صورة. هذا [ث فيرست تيم] جعلت صورة روبرت فاولر في عمليّة أسر يتلقّى يكون جمهور. أنا يستطيع لا يكذب إلى أسفل على الدثار لأنّ ظهري آذى [توو موش]. ويمشي أنا بعد ذلك نحو هذا شدادة وهو قد جثم على هذا نار بالغ الصّغر, يجعل ه شاي وهو تنظر فوق ويقول, يتلقّى أنت يحسب خارجا الذي نحن نكون بعد? وأنا جدّا تجريبيّا وبلا قناعة في جميعا يقول جيّدا, يعني أنا أنت ال [منج]? ويعطيني هو نظرة مزدر ويقول, [إين فّكت], أنا يعني ماذا أنا كنت أتمّ يعلق حوالي مع أنّ تركيا, أنت يعرف? أنا [سنغلس]. أنا أتلقّى لاشيء أن يتمّ مع نيجر سياسة.
هو لم يقل كلّ أنّ, قال هو فقط "أنا [سنغلس]". وقال أنا "[أه]". وبعد ذلك يقول هو: 'نحن [أل-قدا]. و [فلّ] القعر من عالمي خارجا. '
و… أنا شدادة الذي يكون باستمرار نوع من يركض إحصائيّة حمقاء في عقله, أنت يعرف? أنا أعني يريد أنّ ضوء تغير قبل أن يعدّ أنا إلى 10? وماذا يكون الأرجحية من ي يتمّ شيء قبل أن يطير الثلج أولى أو أنت تعرف, أنّ نوع الشيء.
هكذا ماذا يكون الأرجحية أنا يذهب أن [كم ووت وف] هذا حيّة كان بوضوح كبيرة واحدة. وفي أنّ نقطة, حسب أنا خمسة نسبة مئويّة لأنّ [لوور] كان أيضا خفّض. غير أنّ "نحن [أل-قدا]", وهناك بعد ذلك, يبدأ بيتر, كلّك حسابات [إرلير].
هكذا هم [أل-قدا], وماذا يكون المنظّمة الأمم المتّحدة يذهب أن يتمّ [فيس--فيس] [أل-قدا]? ماذا يكون الحكومة كندا يذهب أن يتمّ [فيس--فيس] [أل-قدا]? ماذا يكون الالغرب يذهب أن يتمّ?
[منسبريدج]: هم أرادوا أنت لأنّ أنت كنت منظّمة الأمم المتّحدة أو لأنّ أنت كنت كنديّة?
فاولر: منظّمة الأمم المتّحدة.
[منسبريدج]: الإصدار كنديّ تحت في كلّ?
فاولر: رفض, يفكّر أنا هو كان يضاف علاوة ل هم. غير أنّ هم - غير أنّ يفكّر أنا هذا كلّ يذهب [بك تو] مهمتهم وما إذا أو لا نحن كنّا هدف الفرصة أو يستهدف مهمة. هكذا كان هو كبيرة منظّمة الأمم المتّحدة شدادة ماذا, يكون ماذا هم تلقّفوا.
عقب "نحن يكون [أل-قدا]", ونحن يكون يسافر [مور ند مور] - في أيّ وقت يعزّز شمالا, وما من شك يشعر منخفضة, يضرّر ولا جدّا شجاعة, أنا سأل السائقة, يكون هو نيتك أن ينفّذنا?
أنا لا أعرف لما أنا سألت أنّ. أنا لست يوقن أنا حقّا أراد الجوابة. غير أنّ ومع ذلك. But he reacted with very satisfying anger, sort of saying 'nah'. I mean, he said: 'Listen, my mission was to capture you. If my mission had been to execute you, you'd be dead. So don't give me any more of that crap.' I mean that was the idea, which again I found a rather happy response.
MANSBRIDGE: You believed him?
FOWLER: Oh boy, that's a big question then and at any future point. I certainly wanted to believe him, so that would do for a while. Yeah.
MANSBRIDGE VOICE-OVER: The chaotic first days stretched into weeks. After 56 hours of brutal off-road driving, a trip that fractured one of Fowler's vertebrae, the hostages were shuffled from camp to camp in northern Mali. All the while, he was held at gunpoint by 20 insurgents, one as young as seven.
Camp life became routine. Fowler wore out his shoes through daily exercise, repairing them with thorns. And he secretly kept track of days by marking his leather belt.
MANSBRIDGE: Tell me about movie night.
FOWLER: As night falls they take three spare tires and pile them one on top of the other, haul out their nifty laptop, plug it into the engine, to the cigarette lighter in the engine compartment, and fire it up and we watch what we call TV night. They would have [a video view] of sniper rifles as they sort of popped the heads off GIs in Iraq and Afghanistan, endless IEDs [improvised explosive devices] blowing up Humvees, trucks and convoys in Iraq and Afghanistan. Lots of suicide bombers crashing through gates blowing up, some buildings … and every time this would happen the audience would scream and wasn't that great.
MANSBRIDGE: Every time there was a TV night they'd play the same?
FOWLER: Oh no, sometimes they had new [movies]. Al-Qaeda central would send them a new hot DVD. Actually the only time I saw real excitement was a guy running in from with a new DVD. Boy, you know we have a bestseller tonight. And they would, it was clearly these were propaganda films, rather good production values. I mean they were well made. It was to pump up the boys. I mean to remind them of what it was all about, and they were Mujahadeen and death in the calls is what it's all about and we will prevail. I eventually refused to go to TV night, but created a bit of an issue, but not a huge issue, a bit of an issue. I said I had seen the twin towers come down 400 times. I don't need to see them again.
MANSBRIDGE: Now you became featured in videos yourself?
FOWLER: Yes.
MANSBRIDGE: There were three in total?
FOWLER: Four actually.
MANSBRIDGE: Four. And now the idea initially was 'proof of life' videos?
FOWLER: Yes that's certainly what I thought. They're not all the same. But the first one we did on Day 5. We were ushered into a tent. The only time we were ever in a tent was to make videos. I didn't like tents. Every time I walked into a tent I remembered Daniel Pearl and it wasn't a good memory.
Each one was different, very different. The first one was what I kind of expected to be; it was proof of life. I'd seen the movies. I knew that that's what had to happen and I knew that that meant my family would know that I was captured and they were not going to be real happy about the al-Qaeda part of it.
I think I was suggesting to you they're not technically incompetent. I mean just a total contradiction of these guys festooned with sat phones, cell phones, GPSs, walkie-talkies, video cameras and laptops — whose minds are 15 centuries away, whose weapons are a couple of generations old, and who really wish they didn't have rifles and could get back to the days of the scimitar and saber. Strange contradictions.
Video three was very different. Somber. No backdrop when we got in there. Hands behind our back. Blindfolded for the first time. And we're told 'don't speak'. You have no speaking role. Don't speak.
And all I know of that video was I guy intoning behind me a long screed in Arabic with lots of references to al-Qaeda, Jihad, Muhjahadeen, Allah and Allahu Akhbar and blindfolds came off, we were taken out of the tent, taken back to our tree and left alone, absolutely alone. Nobody talked to us, nobody came near us.
And I did not feel happy about that. I didn't know what had happened. I guessed — and does it happen I think I guessed absolutely accurately — it was a death threat, an ultimatum.
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