Independent UK

Yvonne Ridley: Jabatan Perisikan Mahu Saya Dibunuh

(Intelligence services wanted me killed )

Oleh: Jo Dillon

Yvonne Ridley wartawan wanita British yang telah ditangkap oleh Taliban, telah membuat satu dakwaan yang sungguh luarbiasa minggu ini betapa badan perisikan barat telah mencuba agar beliau dibunuh untuk menaikkan sokongan rakyat terhadap serangan udara di Afghanistan.

Dalam bukunya yang terbaru, 'In the hands of the Taliban' (ketika dicengkam Taliban) yang akan diedarkan esok, wartawan 'Express' ini yang berusia 43 tahun, berkata walaupun telah dibebaskan dia masih ada beberapa urusan yang belum selesai berkaitan pengalamannya di Afghanistan.

Beliau mendakwa sekembalinya ke Pakistan dia mendapati bilik hotel yang ditempahnya telah digeledah. Di London, kunci-mangga apartmennya di Soho telah dicemari orang. Kemudian seorang wartawan di Al-Jazeera telah menunjukkan satu koleksi beberapa dokumen yang belum dikenalpasti. Antaranya adalah salinan beberapa kepilan dokumen peribadi beliau termasuk penyata akaun dan gambar.

Apabila diberitahu semua dokumen itu telah diserahkan kepada Taliban, Ms. Ridley berkata: 'Siapa agaknya musibat yang mahu melihat saya ditembak'?

Dengan bantuan QC Michael Mansfield, seorang wartawan Al-Jazeera, Nacer Bedri, dan beberapa kenalan dalam jabatan perisikan, Mr. Ridley ini sedang berusaha mengumpul semua bahan yang menyebabkan perkara itu berlaku.

Beliau berkata semua dokumen itu adalah salinan fotokopi borang bayaran cukai pendapatan dan geran tanah kepada sebuah rumah yang memang dimilikinya, satu ketika dulu. Kemudian ada pula satu salinan pasport milik suaminya yang ketiga, Hemosh, bersama dengan nombor keanggotaan Mossad dan kad pengenalan kepunyaan beliau. Jumlah penyata kewangan sengaja digembar-gemburkan, kata Ms. Ridley. Ada sekeping gambar Ms.Ridley bersama Hemosh dan anak perempuannya yang berusia sembilan tahun kini. 'Gambar ini diambil di tebing sebuah sungai di Iran ketika anda memasukinya secara haram.'

Dalam bukunya Ridley ada menjelaskan: 'Saya mengamati gambar itu sekali lagi dan mula ketawa. Ketika itu saya sedar betapa gambar itu diambil pada Oktober 1988 di Stratford-upon-Avon. Kemudian, saya merasa sesuatu yang mual sehingga mahu muntah dibuatnya. Barulah saya teringat di mana gambar itu pernah saya lihat sebelumnya - di atas laci teratas di apartmen saya di Soho. Saya telah menceraikan suami nombor 3, beberpa minggu selepas gambar itu disemadikan; ia dicuci hanya beberapa lama selepas itu, jauh lebih lama selepas dia pergi. Jadi, siapakah yang masuk menceroboh apartmen saya? '

Ms. Ridley semakin yakin ada pembabitan jabatan perisikan - dan bersumpah mahu membuktikannya. 'Tanpa bercakap banyak, saya tidak akan biarkan perkara itu,' kata beliau kelmarin.

Penerbitan buku itu dan dakwaannya sudah tentu menjadikan Ms. Ridley bahan perhatian ramai sekali lagi. - ini merupakan satu kedudukan yang tidak disenanginya sejak ditangkap oleh Taliban pada 28 Sepember dan selepas dibebaskan pada 8 Oktober.

Ms. Ridley pernah dicemuh kerana bertindak gila-gila memasuki Afghanistan dan ramai para pengulas menuduh beliau sengaja mengada-ngada kerana mengambl risiko itu sedangkan beliau adalah seorang ibu tunggal.

Ada pula pihak lain yang mempertikaikan waktu Ridley berada di Afghanistan. Ada satu laporan yang menyebut kenapakah Ridley tidak ditangkap ketika berada di Afghanistan tetapi selepas berada di wilayah sempadan Pakistan - menunjukkan dia tidak pernah memasuki Afghanistan.

Sekembalinya ke England, Ms. Ridley telah dikritik kerana mengabaikan kisah penderitaan dua orang pemandunya yang masih dipenjara ketika itu - mereka ditangkap kerana membantu beliau dan juga pegawai bantuan amal yang berada bersama beliau. Sambutan awal bukunya itu tidaklah hebat sangat, tetapi Ms. Ridley berazam untuk membongkar apa sebenarnya yang terjadi kepada masalahnya.

Terjemahan: SPAR
10.12.01

Asal:

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/media/story.jsp?story=109164

Intelligence services wanted me killed, says journalist

Yvonne Ridley makes astonishing claim in book about her days of captivity with the Taliban

By Jo Dillon, Political Correspondent

09 December 2001

Yvonne Ridley, the British journalist captured by the Taliban, this week makes the extraordinary claim that Western intelligence agencies tried to get her killed to bolster public support for the air strikes on Afghanistan.

In her new book, In The Hands of the Taliban, published tomorrow, Express journalist Ms Ridley, 43, says despite her release from captivity she still has "unfinished business" surrounding her time in Afghanistan.

She claims that on her return to Pakistan she found her hotel room had been searched. In London, the locks on her Soho flat had apparently been tampered with. A journalist on the Arab TV station Al Jazeera then showed her a collection of as yet unverified documents. They purported to be copies of a dossier of personal and financial papers and pictures.

When told they had been handed to the Taliban, Ms Ridley asked: "Who the hell was trying to get me shot?"

With the help of prominent QC Michael Mansfield, the Al Jazeera journalist, Nacer Bedri, and contacts in the security and intelligence services, Ms Ridley is now trying to piece together what happened.

She says the documents were photocopies of genuine-looking Inland Revenue tax returns and the title deeds to a previous London home owned by her. There was also a copy of an Israeli passport belonging to her third husband, Hermosh, along with a Mossad code number and ID card also said to belong to him. The figures in the financial documents were exaggerated, Ms Ridley said. Also in the bundle was a photograph of Ms Ridley, Hermosh and her daughter Daisy, now aged nine, "taken on a river in Iran when you entered the country illegally".

Ms Ridley's book says: "I looked at the picture again and initially laughed, when I realised it had been taken in October 1998 in Stratford-upon-Avon. Then an awful feeling came to my stomach and I wanted to vomit. I remembered where I had last seen that picture - in my top drawer at my new flat in Soho. I had kicked out Husband No 3 a couple of weeks after those pictures were taken; they weren't developed until later - after he had gone. So who had been in my flat?"

Ms Ridley is convinced the intelligence services must have somehow been involved - and has vowed to prove it. "Without giving too much away, I can say the matter isn't going to rest," she said yesterday.

The publication of her book and the claims it makes are certain to throw Ms Ridley back into the spotlight - a place that has not been particularly comfortable for her since she was captured by the Taliban on 28 September and after her release on 8 October.

Ms Ridley was lambasted for making a "foolhardy" decision to go into Afghanistan with a number of commentators accusing her of being "selfish" for taking such a risk as a single mother.

Others raised questions about Ms Ridley's time in Afghanistan, one report claiming that rather than being captured in the country where she was carrying out a newspaper investigation; she was picked up over the border in Pakistan and had never entered Afghanistan.

On her return, Ms Ridley was criticised for failing to pay enough attention in her account of her ordeal to the two guides - then still in prison - captured helping her or the aid workers held alongside her. Early reviews of her book were far from flattering. But Ms Ridley is determined to get to the bottom of her own story.