http://www.smh.com.au/news/World/Alive-and-free-after-47-days/2005/06/15/1118645869970.htmlFreed Australian hostage Douglas Wood has thanked Iraqi troops for helping to rescue him from insurgents after a military operation in Iraq secured his release after 47 days in captivity.In a message read by Nick Warner, the head of Australia’s emergency response team sent to secure his release in Iraq, Mr Wood said he was “extremely happy and relieved to be free”.
He was reportedly freed by the Iraqi army’s 2nd battalion, 1 Armoured Brigade, with the help of US forces in Ghazaliya – one of the most dangerous Sunni Arab neighbourhoods of Baghdad.
Mr Wood was found by Iraqi troops when they raided a house in Baghdad on Wednesday and pulled back a blanket that his captors said was covering a sick relative, an Iraqi general said.
“He was under a blanket. He was tied down and they claimed that he was their father and he was sick,” Lieutenant General Nasir Abadi said.
Mr Warner, who is Australia’s Ambassador for Counter-Terrorism, said the morning raid on the house in the Ghazaliya area of western Baghdad had been part of a citywide security sweep, but there had also been a tip-off about the house’s occupants.
Mr Wood, who has a serious heart condition, was in the care of Australian special forces and undergoing medical checks in a hospital in Baghdad.
Earlier the Prime Minister, John Howard, announced the 63-year-old engineer was “recovered … in Baghdad in a military operation that I’m told was carried out by Iraqi forces in co-operation with the forces of the United States”.
The Foreign Affairs Minister, Alexander Downer, said Mr Wood seemed to be in good shape but was “mentally, obviously absolutely exhausted”.
The military operation had been one of the options the Government had approved. It is believed no one was killed but people were detained, he said.
Mr Howard said: “It hasn’t happened very often that somebody has been rescued in this fashion.”
Mr Wood, who worked as a private contractor in Iraq, was abducted in late April by a group calling itself the Shura Council of the Mujahideen of Iraq. He was last sighted on April 29. The group released a DVD on May 2 showing Mr Wood surrounded by armed men and pleading for his life and for Australia to withdraw its troops from Iraq.
A second DVD broadcast by the Al-Jazeera TV network on May 10 showed Mr Wood with heavy bruising under one eye and his head shaved. In it he said: “Move out of Iraq or I will be killed.”
A spokesman for Mr Wood’s family, Neil Small, said Mr Wood’s wife in the US had been told of his release. A statement released by Mr Wood’s family in Australia said: “It has been a horrifying ordeal for him. The family is greatly relieved.”
Mr Wood’s brother, Malcolm, said outside his home in Canberra that he had not spoken with him.
Sheik Taj el-Din al Hilaly, the Australian Muslim cleric who travelled to Iraq last month to help secure Mr Wood’s release, was “ecstatic”.
His spokesman in Sydney, Keysar Trad, said he believed Mr Wood would be taken to Germany for treatment and then to the US. He did not know when or if he would return to Australia.
“We believe that the mufti’s efforts have been instrumental in this release,” Mr Trad said.
Sheik Hilaly thanked “honest Iraqis” for helping him organise the release of Mr Wood.
“My mission is successful,” he said in an interview with SBS’s Arabic language program.
Within days of Mr Wood’s capture, the Government sent a special team to Baghdad to try to make contact with the kidnappers, and made a personal plea to the insurgents on Al-Jazeera television.
Mr Wood’s family in Australia also pleaded for his life and offered a generous “charitable donation” to the Iraqi people.
Mr Wood had been working in Iraq for about 18 months before his capture.
The Australian Defence Force chief, General Peter Cosgrove, who was in a regular meeting of the federal cabinet’s national security committee about 5pm with Mr Howard, received information there was news coming out of Baghdad about Mr Wood.
Mr Downer and General Cosgrove confirmed that Mr Wood had been released about 4pm Sydney time and had been taken into the international zone in Baghdad.
Mr Howard said he had been trying to contact the Iraqi Prime Minister, Ibrahim al-Jaafari, to thank him for his country’s help in securing Mr Wood’s release”.
He also paid tribute to Sheik Hilaly. “I also place on record my appreciation for the efforts of the Australian Islamic community and of Sheik Taj al Hilaly.”
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Wood freed ‘from pick-up point’
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200506/s1393214.htm
An associate of Australia Muslim cleric Sheik Taj el-Din Al Hilaly, who went to Baghdad to seek the Australian’s release, says hostage Douglas Wood was rescued from a pick-up point.
Keysar Trad says Sheikh Hilaly received the information from go-betweens he was using to communicate with the abductors.
In effect, he says Iraqi and US forces were told where and when they could collect Mr Wood.
“He said to me that this had been a pre-arranged pick-up, that a location had been communicated to him where Mr Wood could be picked up and that location was communicated to the Australian task force,” Mr Trad told ABC TV’s Lateline.
“As far as he understood it, it was a negotiated release from a safe location.
“Mr Wood had been delivered to that safe house where he was later to be picked up by the Iraqis in association with American military personnel.”
Mr Trad says the release was a team effort between the Mufti and the Australian Government.
“The Mufti is saying that his negotiation in cooperation with the Australian task force [resulted in Mr Wood’s release],” he said.
“It has been a collaborative, cooperative approach all along, that the Australian Government has facilitated his movements in Iraq, guaranteed his safety and when he was unwell ensured he received the necessary medical treatment.
“The Australian Government has been quite cooperative, quite supportive all along and by working together – if the Australian Government had not worked with the Mufti they would not have got this result, if the Mufti had not worked with them, by the same token he would not have got this result either.
“So it’s a joint cooperative approach that produced an excellent result for all of us.”
Howard Praises Iraqis For ‘Miracle’ Release
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200506/s1393364.htm
The Prime Minister, John Howard, has described Australian hostage Douglas Wood’s release as a miracle and says he must have a guardian angel.
Mr Howard has paid tribute to the Iraqis for their role in Mr Wood’s release.
“It is a miracle that he has been released but let us give enormous credit to the Iraqis,” Mr Howard told radio 2GB.
He says Mr Wood was released by a military operation which he believes was led by Iraqi forces and supported by the US.
“I want to say again how grateful Australia is to the Iraqi Government and the Iraqi forces as well as our American friends for what they’ve done,” he said.
The Prime Minister paid tribute to the Australian emergency response team sent to Iraq to free Mr Wood, for its “tireless” work.
He also thanked Australian Sheikh Taj el-Din Al Hilaly and the Australian Muslim community for their efforts.
“I think it’s fair to say that the release was achieved by this military operation but I don’t want to play down the efforts of a whole lot of people – including the Mufti – to bring about Mr Wood’s release,” Mr Howard said.
Mr Howard says the whole country is jubilant at the “happy ending”.
They are sentiments echoed by Opposition Leader Kim Beazley.
“This is a joyous moment for the Wood family, who conducted themselves so stoically,” he said.
No ransom
Foreign Minister Alexander Downer says the Government appreciates the contribution of Australia’s Islamic community.
He says neither the Government nor the Wood family paid a ransom.
“The family said that they would be prepared to make a financial contribution to an Iraqi charity but in the end no contribution was made to an Iraqi charity and no ransom was paid,” Mr Downer said.
Nick Warner, the head of the emergency response team, has given a brief outline of his team’s strategy to secure the release.
“We engaged in an extensive media campaign, and indeed a political campaign, aimed at reaching out to the Iraqi people … in an effort to find possible intermediaries,” he said.
Sheikh Al Hilaly told SBS radio that his efforts led to Mr Wood’s release.
“My mission is successful … I would like to thank honest Iraqis who helped me secure the relase of Douglas Wood,” he said.
Mr Downer says he is not sure when Mr Wood will be reunited with his wife and family.