Carroll Threatened Before Release?
Charles Johnson
Fri Mar 31, 2006 at 10:32 am PST • Views: 412
The Christian Science Monitor is reporting that Jill Carroll was threatened before her release, and that her video interview with the mujahideen in which she made anti-American statements was coerced.
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Jill Carroll’s kidnappers reportedly warned her before her release that she might be killed if she cooperated with the Americans or went to the Green Zone, saying it was infiltrated by insurgents.
The freelance writer for The Christian Science Monitor, who was freed by her captors Thursday and dropped off at a branch office of the Iraqi Islamic Party, was later escorted to the Green Zone by the U.S. military, the newspaper said Friday.
At first, she was reluctant to go, but a Monitor writer in Baghdad, Scott Peterson, convinced her it was safe, the newspaper said.
The Monitor quoted her family as saying that her kidnappers had warned her against talking to the Americans or going to the Green Zone. They told her it was “infiltrated by the mujahedeen,” the newspaper said.
Note that all of these statements seem to come from the family, not from Carroll herself.
UPDATE at 3/31/06 11:33:50 am:
Meryl Yourish points out this quote from the New York Times:
Tariq al-Hashemi, the general secretary of the Iraqi Islamic Party, said at a news conference that Ms. Carroll walked into the office and handed officials a paper written in Arabic asking that the party help her.
Alaa Makki, another leader in the party, said Ms. Carroll seemed wary about talking about her captors. “We asked her, ‘Why did you come to the I.I.P.? Why did you choose the I.I.P.?’ ” he recalled. “She said, ‘I really don’t know.’ ”
He went on: “She said, ‘I promised the kidnappers not to speak.’ She was a little bit frightened. She was very careful. She didn’t give much information.”
Frank says: