According to Yahoo News, a New York Times reporter escaped from Taliban captivity. David S. Rohde, who is 41 years of age, was well known for doing dangerous footage. In fact, he was part of a team of reporters who won a Pulitzer prize for the footage that they covered in Afghanistan during 2008. He is the author of a book, which is titled “Endgame: The Betrayal and Fall of Srebrenica.”
Rohde was taken into captivity by the Taliban on November 10 of 2008. Rohde was not abducted alone. He was with Tahir Ludin, who is one of his reporter colleagues, and also a driver from the city of Kabul in Afghanistan. This is where the three were captured from. They were transported about 100 miles to the compound where they have been held since November.
At the time of his capture, Rohde was in Afghanistan to work on a book. He was on leave from the New York Times.
When Rohde escaped from captivity in Pakistan, he and Ludin both climbed over a wall of the compound that they were being kept in. The two reporters broke free on Friday, June 19th, 2009. The driver that they were with did not escape, according to Rohde.
Yahoo News reports that a U.S. Military spokeswoman said that the military were not involved in the escape. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton thanked both the Pakistan and Afghanistan government for allowing Rohde to arrive home safely.
When David Rohde and Tahir Ludin were kidnapped, there were other attacks happening in Afghanistan during this time. Other journalists, such as Canadian Melissa Fung and a Dutch reporter, were also kidnapped around the same time. Rohde was the only one who had to actually escape from captivity, however. These two journalists were released by their captors.
Interestingly enough, this is the first time that most of the world is hearing about the abduction. Rohde’s family, government officials from several countries, and experts in kidnapping cases all felt that it was best to keep the situation on the down low. Most of the news outlets respected the secrecy of the case and did not feature any stories about it to make it well publicized.
This is not the first time that David Rohde was held hostage, however. In 1996, when he won another Pulitzer Prize, he was captured by Serbian officials for ten days. During this time, he was accused of being a spy for NATO. Rohde knew that this trip was going to be a very dangerous one. He said that he knew his editors at Colombia University would not allow him to make the trip, so he intentionally sent them an email late to ensure that they would not get it in time.
