From Europe News:
An engineer in Nigeria, two tourists in Ethiopia, an aid worker in Pakistan: all are German nationals abducted abroad in January. The number of kidnappings have been rising steadily over the past years. A new trend?
Fate can be ironic sometimes, or maybe Jürgen Chrobog was just unlucky. The German diplomat and his family were abducted in Yemen in 2005, only six months after he went into retirement. For two years he had been in charge of the Foreign Ministry's crisis committee handling abduction cases of Germans. But now this professional hostage liberator had become a victim himself.
"We were traveling in two jeeps. Suddenly a pickup truck stopped in front of us and several other cars sped towards us from all directions. Armed men jumped out and starting firing rounds into the air," recounts Chrobog. But in the end the Chrobogs had a close shave - maybe because they had good contacts. The abductors were friendly and took good care of them, releasing them after just three days.
Liberation can take years
Germans are repeatedly abducted abroad. Not all cases are resolved speedily - crisis committees and the public can be on tenterhooks for months. As early as the 1980s, the abduction of two German nationals in Lebanon was making headlines.
In January 1987, the Muslim militant group Hezbollah abducted Hoechst manager Rudolf Cordes and Siemens technician Alfred Schmidt, to secure the release of a Lebanese jailed in Germany - without success. The group eventually freed Schmidt in September but kept Cordes hostage for 605 days.
The ordeal of Heinrich Strübig and Thomas Kemptner lasted even longer. At the time of their abduction in 1989 they were working for an aid organization in Lebanon. They were not freed until 1992, returning to Germany after 1,127 days in captivity. (...)
Are Germans becoming favored kidnapping targets?
Deutsche Welle 30 January 2012
By Monika Griebeler
By Monika Griebeler
Fate can be ironic sometimes, or maybe Jürgen Chrobog was just unlucky. The German diplomat and his family were abducted in Yemen in 2005, only six months after he went into retirement. For two years he had been in charge of the Foreign Ministry's crisis committee handling abduction cases of Germans. But now this professional hostage liberator had become a victim himself.
"We were traveling in two jeeps. Suddenly a pickup truck stopped in front of us and several other cars sped towards us from all directions. Armed men jumped out and starting firing rounds into the air," recounts Chrobog. But in the end the Chrobogs had a close shave - maybe because they had good contacts. The abductors were friendly and took good care of them, releasing them after just three days.
Liberation can take years
Germans are repeatedly abducted abroad. Not all cases are resolved speedily - crisis committees and the public can be on tenterhooks for months. As early as the 1980s, the abduction of two German nationals in Lebanon was making headlines.
In January 1987, the Muslim militant group Hezbollah abducted Hoechst manager Rudolf Cordes and Siemens technician Alfred Schmidt, to secure the release of a Lebanese jailed in Germany - without success. The group eventually freed Schmidt in September but kept Cordes hostage for 605 days.
The ordeal of Heinrich Strübig and Thomas Kemptner lasted even longer. At the time of their abduction in 1989 they were working for an aid organization in Lebanon. They were not freed until 1992, returning to Germany after 1,127 days in captivity. (...)
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