 The three peace activists freed by an SAS-led coalition force after being held hostage in Iraq for four months refused to co-operate fully with an intelligence unit sent to debrief them, a security source claimed yesterday. The claim has infuriated those searching for other hostages.
Neither the men nor the Canadian group that sent them to Iraq have thanked the people who saved them in any of their public statements. One of them, Norman Kember, 74, a retired physics professor, of Pinner, north-west London, was in Kuwait last night and was expected to return to Britain today. He is understood to have given some helpful information. He provided details of the semi-rural area north-west of Baghdad where he was held and confirmed that his captors were criminals, rather than insurgents. Their motive was believed to be money.
The two Canadians kidnapped with Mr Kember - Harmeet Sooden, 32, and Jim Loney, 41 - were said to have been co-operative at first but less so on arriving at the British embassy in Baghdad after being given the opportunity to wash, eat and rest.
| Gratitude faded mighty quick, didn't it. Plus it was an embassy bed, embassy bath and embassy food. |
Previous hostages have been questioned on everything from what shoes their kidnappers wore to the number of mobile phones they had. The pacifist Christian Peacemaker Teams with which the men were visiting Iraq is opposed to the coalition's presence and has accused it of illegally detaining thousands of Iraqis.
Jan Benvie, 51, an Edinburgh teacher who is due to go to Iraq with the organisation this summer, said: "We make clear that if we are kidnapped we do not want there to be force or any form of violence used to release us."
| It's the moral part of us that causes us to rescue hostages, something you wouldn't understand. |
Although the CPTs has welcomed the men's release, it has not thanked the rescuers in any of its statements. It blamed the kidnapping on the presence of foreign troops in the country, which was "responsible for so much pain and suffering in Iraq today". When told how angry the coalition was feeling, Claire Evans, a spokesman for the CPTs in America, said: "We are extremely grateful to everybody who had a role leading to the men's release."
| Then she went back to meowing. |
Mr Kember, in a statement through the embassy, said: "I have had the opportunity to have a shave, relax in the bath and a good English breakfast. I am very much looking forward to getting home to British soil and to being reunited with my family." He did not publicly thank his rescuers.
Gen Sir Mike Jackson, the chief of the defence staff, told Channel 4 News: "I am slightly saddened that there does not seem to have been a note of gratitude for the soldiers who risked their lives to save those lives."
Asked if he meant that Mr Kember had not said thank you, he said: "I hope he has and I have missed it."
It emerged that about 50 soldiers, led by the SAS, including men from 1 Bn the Parachute Regiment and the Royal Marines, as well as American and Canadian special forces, entered the kidnap building at dawn.
| Canadian special forces in Iraq? That twitched the surprise meter. |
A deal had been struck with a man detained the previous night who was one of the leaders of the kidnappers. He was allowed a telephone call to warn his henchmen to leave the kidnap house. When the troops moved in and found the prisoners alive, they also let him go as promised. |
A New Zealand hostage released from captivity in Iraq believes a ransom was paid for his freedom. Harmeet Sooden, a 32-year-old Auckland University student, has spoken publicly for the first time about his kidnapping and four-month detention. Harmeet Sooden was one of three members of the Christian Peacemaker Team rescued a week ago by British special forces in Iraq. A fourth American colleague was murdered by the kidnappers. 
A second car bomb hit a market area outside a Shia Muslim mosque in the mostly mixed Shia-Sunni neighbourhood of Shurta in southwest Baghdad. At least six people were killed and more than 20 wounded, many of them children, police said. Roadside bombs targeting police patrols killed four others two policemen and two bystanders in Baghdad and at least one policeman in Iskandariyah. Police said dozens were wounded. Another two policemen were killed and two were wounded when gunmen ambushed their convoy in north Baghdad, an attack that police said was an aborted attempt to free detainees who were being transferred to the northern city of Mosul.