The kidnapping this week of an Irish tourist in Iran highlights the dangersthat lie in wait for the unwary backpacker, writes Rosita Boland
For a cyclist, the utterly flat desert landscape of south-east Iran, close to the Pakistani border, at this relatively cool time of year, would provide good conditions for travelling. It lies between the historic and stunning ruined city of Bam, made entirely of mud-bricked walls and structures, some of which date back 800 years, and the provincial capital of Zahedan. It was from this area that Irish tourist Aidan Leahy and his two German male companions were kidnapped on a cycling trip this week. Leahy is believed to be in his 30s and usually resident in the UK.
The trio were reportedly kidnapped by Iranian drug smugglers, who are demanding a ransom of €5 million. The tourists apparently did not report their intentions to travel by bike through the area to the local authorities. However, until further details emerge, it may be that they were not aware of the necessity to do this.
While there are still backpackers travelling overland through Iran by public transport and on privately-owned motorbikes, independent travellers on push-bikes in Iran must be few enough to be considered unusual. The Department of Foreign Affairs in Ireland and their German counterpart have been in contact with Tehran, but to date there are no more hard facts available about the whereabouts of the three tourists.
Ireland's Department of Foreign Affairs does not have a designated travel advice section on its website. Instead, it has a link to the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office's (FCO) website. "The FCO have diplomatic representatives in every country worldwide, so they are in a much better position to give advice on those countries," the DFA said this week.
When a holiday far from home goes terribly, sometimes fatally, wrong, clearly the consequences have a resonance far beyond the lives of those immediately involved. "What if?" people must think, "Could that happen to me?"
There was a time when the dangers of travelling abroad were almost exclusively health-related. All those nasty illnesses you could get, such as malaria, rabies, typhoid, cholera, hepatitis, dengue fever, and Japanese encephalitis. Those illnesses are still present in many parts of the world, but they are not usually the first concern people have these days when considering a trip abroad.
The primary concern which intending tourists have these days is whether the country is safe? Or, are there enough safe areas within that country to merit it worth travelling to?
The events of September 11th, 2001, have meant that threats of terrorism are now an additional unknown quantity; nobody can predict where it may happen next. The FCO website currently lists 12 major terrorist attacks on Westerners that have taken place in the last 18 months, by way of illustrating the risk of terrorism when travelling abroad. These include: the attacks last month in Istanbul on British targets; 40 people killed in suicide attacks on a hotel and restaurants frequented by westerners in Casablanca; the suicide bombings in Riyadh, that targeted the homes of Westerners, both of them in May; and the Bali bombs in October last year, which killed 200 people.
In addition to the insidious global threat of some centrally-organised terrorism network, there is also the threat of local political unrest. Countries such as Cambodia, Colombia, the Yemen, Malaysia and Uganda have all had well-publicised incidences of kidnapping by local faction fighters go horribly wrong. The adage, safety in numbers, unfortunately does not apply to kidnapping of tourists, who are virtually always in groups when taken.
The most recent internationally high-profile kidnapping has been in Colombia last September. Eight tourists were taken from the Sierra Nevada region, 700 kilometres north of Bogota, and marched away on foot to a location as yet still unknown. The kidnappers are believed to be FARC guerillas. One of the captured tourists, a 19-year-old Briton, Matthew Scott, managed to escape by jumping into a ravine and trekking alone through the jungle for almost two weeks before he was found by Indians. Just last month two more captives - one Spanish, one German - were released. Four Israelis and another Briton remain captive, butColombian Marxist rebels have promised to release them later this year.
Not everyone who was in that trekking group were taken by the bandits. Five were left behind. An Australian couple who were not taken, Michelle Walkden and her husband, Mark Tuite, think it was because they were both overweight and neither of them were wearing hiking boots. Walkden had left hers behind at a hut they had stopped at en route, intending to collect them on return as she found them too heavy.
In 1999, a group of 32 Westerners were kidnapped from a gorilla-watching tourist camp in a national park in Uganda by Rwandan rebels, based in the Congo. Eight of them were hacked to death with machetes the following day.
Until 1998, all of the 150 tourists kidnapped by tribesmen in the Yemen were released unharmed. Yemen journalist Shaker Alashwal explained in a 1997 article: "The availability of weapons in Yemen makes kidnapping easy. The tribesmen are aware of the government's desire to attract foreign investments. Kidnapping foreigners therefore has become a way for tribes to pressure the government to meet their demands. The kidnappings in Yemen are different and unique from other kidnappings, many of the tourists return carrying gifts from the kidnappers, including silver jewellery, and daggers.
"Recently an Italian tourist who was held hostage for five days asserted that it was a wonderful experience. 'Too bad it's not possible to organise holidays like this because it was fantastic,' Giorgio Bonanomi said. He said his kidnappers fed him lamb and exotic fruits."
The following year, in 1998, four tourists, two Britons, a Canadian and an Australian, were killed in the Yemen during a bungled rescue operation. The kidnappers used the tourists as human shields between themselves and the Yemen authorities.
In 1993, despite many warnings of the danger of train travel on certain routes in a still-unstable Cambodia, three Australian, British and French backpackers were abducted from a train travelling between Phnom Penh and the southern beach destination of Sihanoukville. Thirteen Cambodians also died in that ambush. The Westerners were held by Khmer Rouge rebels, and video footage of them during that time depicted ever more haunted and tormented faces. They were murdered two months after being kidnapped.
It is perhaps impossible to be vigilant always against the unknown when travelling in a foreign country, particularly if you are on an organised tour or trek, situations from which many tourists have been kidnapped in the past. The only additional precaution you can take is to avoid visiting countries during elections, which can be infamously volatile times; avoid huge crowds or political rallies; and always heed local travel advice. There are many wonders still worth seeing in the world, but not one of them is worth endangering your life for.