Dealing with kidnappers

Press, 16 August 1980, Page 17

Dealing with kidnappers

"ortune’s Hostages: A study of Kidnapping in the World Today. By Caroline Moorehead. Hamish Hamilton, 1980. 256 pp. $30.75.

(Reviewed by

A. J. Curry)

In the last decade 400 people have een kidnapped by terrorists, and political kidnapping is increasing ecause it is succeeding. The author las made a study of kidnapping, and of the pressures it imposes on its victims and the societies in which :hey live. Her book is divided into three parts. In the first part she traverses verv briefly the history of kidnapping and abduction, beginning with the Greek myths and continuing well into the Middle Ages. Special orders of priests, the Mercederians. Tiniterians, and Redemptorists came into being especially to negotiate for the return of Christians from the Barbary Coast pirates. China in Marco Polo's time, and the United States in the 1930 s both experienced outbreaks of kidnapping, but the one country in which it has flourished since Tiberio came to conquer the island in 177 B.C. is Sardinia. Shepherds of the mountainous Nuoro province of Sardinia also became bandits specialising in kidnapping when the enclosure laws of 1820 allowed peasants to fence and restrict the movements of the hitherto nomadic shepherds. The Sardinian bandits were and are primarily interested in the ransom money. Kidnapping as a political weapon has been a feature of the 19605, beginning in the South American states and spreading later on to Europe. In part two of her book the author traces the spread of kidnapping. Diplomats and businessmen from multinational companies were the prime targets for a variety of Leftwing and radical groups ranging from the Tupamaros of Uruguay to the F.A.R. of Argentina. It spread to Europe where it was practised with chilling efficiency by the Red Brigades

and culminated in the death of Aldo Moro, leader of Italy’s Christian Democrat Party. In West Germany, it was the Baader-Meinhof gang whose main object in kidnapping was to free imprisoned comrades. In the third and final part of the book the author turns from the kidnappers to the victims, and what various societies are doing to protect their members. As more and more victims are able to speak about their experiences, psychologists and . others whose task it is to conduct negotiations with kidnappers are able better to understand how to do so. Most victims, of course, never escape and those who do speak of a mental rather than a physical agony; Those cope best who can pass the time by a variety of ingenious ways, and in this they have much incommon with prisoner-of-war and ' concentration camp survivors. In some victims, what begins as a primitive urge to survive can turn into fondness. An identification is made between kidnapper and victim. For governments the problem is whether to give in to the demands, or say in advance that no concessions will be made, and stick to it Israel is an example of a country which has never accepted to demands, even when children are involved, as they were at Ma’alot in 1974. Action at international level has been hampered by an inability to reach a conclusion as to what is to count as kidnapping and what is a legitimate act of political expression. ■ In the end, guerilla groups can only be prevented from taking hostages if there are no such groups left. It sounds, therefore, as though- it all depends upon the- capacity of local security forces to destroy. guerrilla groups. The S.A.S. in England is a highly successful security -force, but how. effective - is it against the squads which are alleged ,to be sent from Libya? There is one thing which Caroline .Moorehead makes-clear,, and that is that in the kidnapping, and hostage game there are no rules. .