Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
BRIT HOSTAGE HELD BY ISIS ‘STILL ALIVE’
Senior official raises hopes for John Cantlie
A BRITISH hostage held by Islamic State for more than six years may still be alive, a senior government official claimed yesterday.
War photographer John Cantlie, 49, was last seen in 2016 being filmed by his terrorist captors in the Iraqi city of Mosul, which was held at the time by the militant mob. He was thought to have been killed either in coalition airstrikes bombarding the city before it was retaken by Iraqi forces in 2017, or by retreating IS commanders before they fled to Syria.
There were also rumours he had been taken back to the network’s Syrian stronghold of Raqqa, before being sent to
East Syria after that city fell to Kurdish forces.
Security Minister
Ben Wallace told foreign reporters and researchers at the Home Office yesterday that Mr
Cantlie is believed to be still alive.
But senior British security sources said there is no new evidence to support the claims.
Support group Free John Cantlie said in statement: “We are aware of the current news circulating that John Cantlie is alive. “While this is not substantiated at present we continue to hope and pray that this turns out to be true.”
Mr Cantlie, whose work has appeared in THE story of John Cantlie is enormously sad – a terrible thing to happen to a journalist putting himself in harm’s way to tell the story of the Syria conflict.
Of course everyone prays he will be found alive, but in recent years this hope has become remote. What he has suffered is unimaginable. It is the worst nightmare of any journalist travelling to war zones.
And the truth is, this latest possible glimmer of hope from a senior government minister has been treated with scepticism by intelligence sources.
I met John when he visited the Mirror a number of newspapers, is the last remaining UK hostage held by IS.
The Hampshire-born photographer was first held in Syria in 2012 but escaped with help from the Free Syrian Army. He was captured again later that year – supposedly with US journalist James Foley, who was later killed by British terrorist Mohammed Emwazi, dubbed Jihadi John. In captivity, Mr Cantlie appeared in a series of videos in Syria and Iraq, apparently under duress. In the last of these in Mosul in 2016 he was forced to ridicule Us-led attempts to eradicate IS.
In October 2017 French magazine Paris Match quoted an IS fighter saying he had seen Mr Cantlie alive in Raqqa seven or eight months earlier.
Sadly Mr Cantlie’s father Paul died aged 81 from complications following pneumonia in 2014.
It came soon after he made a video appeal from his hospital bed, begging IS to release his son.
The Home Office said in a statement last night: “We do not discuss individual kidnap cases and speculation is unhelpful.”
Western-backed and Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces are still fighting Islamic State in Syria, where a few thousands IS fighters are thought to remain in small pockets in the east of the country.
Two British men accused of being in the IS kidnap and beheading gang known as the Beatles, led by Jihadi John, could go on trial in the US as early as this summer.
El Shafee Elsheikh, 30, and Alexanda Kotey, 35, both of London, are to be transferred to US custody after an FBI request.
They are being held by Kurdish forces in Syria. The Beatles gang murdered more than 20 Western hostages. Jihadi John, also from London, was killed in a 2016 airstrike. offices, shortly before his ill-fated Syria trip, and he struck me as an extremely decent and likeable person.
It would be wonderful if this latest claim turns out to be true and he is finally returned to his family.
John has appeared in a number of videos in various locations in Syria and Iraq, apparently forced to do so under duress.
But security sources have told me on a number of occasions that it was looking increasingly unlikely he had survived the coalition attack on Mosul in northern Iraq.
And having witnessed those airstrikes from inside Mosul myself, it is hard to imagine him surviving that, if he was still being held by Islamic State.
If he had escaped IS during this onslaught, then surely he would have handed himself over to the coalition or to Peshmerga or Iraqi forces.
But there have also been repeated rumours he had been taken back to Syria.
We may never know his fate.