'Spies, Chopin and a last-minute rescue in Libya' diff viewer (0/1)

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Spies, Chopin and a last-minute rescue in Libya	Spies, Chopin and a last-minute rescue in Libya
2013-01-14 07:20:14 UTC	2013-04-12 20:56:17 UTC (3 months later)
Sunday 13 March 2011	Sunday 13 March 2011
Much of the weekend has been spent trying to find the whereabouts of our star Middle Eastern reporter, Ghaith Abdul-Ahad. Ghaith is a charismatic, handsome, brave Iraqi who has been writing for the Guardian for several years now, having originally trained as an architect in his native Baghdad. He is fascinated by all the conflicts in his region and has a relentless thirst to report on all of them – but never from the "official" point of view. He has no interest in being embedded with the US or British armies; he'd much rather trek for a week across hostile mountain terrain in search of the Taliban or Somali pirates. Which makes for unique, wonderfully informative writing (and pictures). But it does land him in trouble – and he appears to be in trouble again. He's disappeared from the radar, after trying to enter Libya from the Tunisian border, travelling with tribesmen.	Much of the weekend has been spent trying to find the whereabouts of our star Middle Eastern reporter, Ghaith Abdul-Ahad. Ghaith is a charismatic, handsome, brave Iraqi who has been writing for the Guardian for several years now, having originally trained as an architect in his native Baghdad. He is fascinated by all the conflicts in his region and has a relentless thirst to report on all of them – but never from the "official" point of view. He has no interest in being embedded with the US or British armies; he'd much rather trek for a week across hostile mountain terrain in search of the Taliban or Somali pirates. Which makes for unique, wonderfully informative writing (and pictures). But it does land him in trouble – and he appears to be in trouble again. He's disappeared from the radar, after trying to enter Libya from the Tunisian border, travelling with tribesmen.
Ghaith always suspects that his mobile phone is being tracked – he is probably right about that – and so his instinct is always to turn it off, and never to use it. But that makes us all very uneasy back in London since we have no idea at all where he is. We've heard nothing for several days now.	Ghaith always suspects that his mobile phone is being tracked – he is probably right about that – and so his instinct is always to turn it off, and never to use it. But that makes us all very uneasy back in London since we have no idea at all where he is. We've heard nothing for several days now.
I've been ringing every contact I can think of – especially highest-level people in the Turkish government. Around lunchtime I manage to get through to Gaddafi's son Saif al-Islam, probably the most influential person in the country, barring the old man himself. He says he knows nothing about Ghaith, but will get back to me. I doubt either part of this is true. It occurs to me I might have to go to Libya myself if nothing else turns up.	I've been ringing every contact I can think of – especially highest-level people in the Turkish government. Around lunchtime I manage to get through to Gaddafi's son Saif al-Islam, probably the most influential person in the country, barring the old man himself. He says he knows nothing about Ghaith, but will get back to me. I doubt either part of this is true. It occurs to me I might have to go to Libya myself if nothing else turns up.
Monday 14 March	Monday 14 March
It's confirmed overnight that Ghaith is being held in prison somewhere in Libya. The outlook is not good for him as he has an Iraqi passport rather than a British one – and even if he had a British one, the embassy in Libya is long closed. The international tensions surrounding Libya are heightening by the hour. The French and British have both been talking about imposing a no-fly zone and there's a lot of talk about military strikes.	It's confirmed overnight that Ghaith is being held in prison somewhere in Libya. The outlook is not good for him as he has an Iraqi passport rather than a British one – and even if he had a British one, the embassy in Libya is long closed. The international tensions surrounding Libya are heightening by the hour. The French and British have both been talking about imposing a no-fly zone and there's a lot of talk about military strikes.
By 3pm I am on a flight to Cairo. I arrive at the hotel at 11pm, just in time to whisk into the city centre to see (a now deserted) Tahrir Square. There are plenty of tanks and armoured cars around, but the square itself is back to its rather unremarkable pre-revolutionary state. I'm travelling with Ian Black, the veteran Middle East editor of the Guardian, who speaks fluent Hebrew and Arabic. Together we've been keeping a log of our attempts, over many days now, to pull all possible strings to get Ghaith out. Between us we've managed to mobilise prime ministers, foreign ministries, spies, presidents, international humanitarian organisations, CEOs and even premiership footballers (one of Gaddafi's sons being madly keen on the sport).	By 3pm I am on a flight to Cairo. I arrive at the hotel at 11pm, just in time to whisk into the city centre to see (a now deserted) Tahrir Square. There are plenty of tanks and armoured cars around, but the square itself is back to its rather unremarkable pre-revolutionary state. I'm travelling with Ian Black, the veteran Middle East editor of the Guardian, who speaks fluent Hebrew and Arabic. Together we've been keeping a log of our attempts, over many days now, to pull all possible strings to get Ghaith out. Between us we've managed to mobilise prime ministers, foreign ministries, spies, presidents, international humanitarian organisations, CEOs and even premiership footballers (one of Gaddafi's sons being madly keen on the sport).
Tuesday 15 March	Tuesday 15 March
We are up at six to catch a (deserted) EgyptAir flight to Libya. We are met off the plane by Libyan officials, who take us off through a VIP exit and into a waiting black Audi A6. The airport has become an enormous makeshift camp, thronged with the tents of the thousands of Africans trying to escape Libya.	We are up at six to catch a (deserted) EgyptAir flight to Libya. We are met off the plane by Libyan officials, who take us off through a VIP exit and into a waiting black Audi A6. The airport has become an enormous makeshift camp, thronged with the tents of the thousands of Africans trying to escape Libya.
We are driven to the Corinthia Hotel – avoiding the Rixos, where the main body of journalists are camped out, in order to keep low-profile. It's a huge new hotel, with maybe 800 bedrooms, but barely any guests. Echoing marble halls, red carpets and gilt. There's a skeleton service at best: almost all the staff have fled. We are warned by the officials that all our conversations will be listened to: spooks will monitor everything. There is no phone signal and no internet, so, for the first time in years, I'm completely out of touch with home or the office. Our colleague Peter Beaumont has been in Libya for two weeks and is staying at the hotel. He is edgy and wired. And it's catching. Within minutes, Ian and I are both feeling uncomfortable.	We are driven to the Corinthia Hotel – avoiding the Rixos, where the main body of journalists are camped out, in order to keep low-profile. It's a huge new hotel, with maybe 800 bedrooms, but barely any guests. Echoing marble halls, red carpets and gilt. There's a skeleton service at best: almost all the staff have fled. We are warned by the officials that all our conversations will be listened to: spooks will monitor everything. There is no phone signal and no internet, so, for the first time in years, I'm completely out of touch with home or the office. Our colleague Peter Beaumont has been in Libya for two weeks and is staying at the hotel. He is edgy and wired. And it's catching. Within minutes, Ian and I are both feeling uncomfortable.
Peter's been picked up two or three times already and detained, once for seven hours. The Daily Telegraph correspondent has been picked up four times. An al-Jazeera correspondent has been shot dead; three BBC staff badly beaten up. Peter has a satphone he can rig up later and which can download emails very slowly. Otherwise he has one Libyan mobile phone with a dead battery and not much credit – the spooks follow westerners on every trip out of the hotel, so it's extraordinarily difficult to get top-up credit or new sim cards for the mobile – and only Libyan sim cards will work. It's totalitarian control of all means of communication.	Peter's been picked up two or three times already and detained, once for seven hours. The Daily Telegraph correspondent has been picked up four times. An al-Jazeera correspondent has been shot dead; three BBC staff badly beaten up. Peter has a satphone he can rig up later and which can download emails very slowly. Otherwise he has one Libyan mobile phone with a dead battery and not much credit – the spooks follow westerners on every trip out of the hotel, so it's extraordinarily difficult to get top-up credit or new sim cards for the mobile – and only Libyan sim cards will work. It's totalitarian control of all means of communication.
It is very eerie walking down the deserted corridors, past empty bedrooms to my own. There's a latch on the door, but there are dents and missing paint by it. It's the same on every bedroom door, suggesting all have been broken into at some stage. In the echoing downstairs lobby there's a Czech-made Petrof grand piano that has seen better days. I run my fingers over the keys, several of which are stuck.	It is very eerie walking down the deserted corridors, past empty bedrooms to my own. There's a latch on the door, but there are dents and missing paint by it. It's the same on every bedroom door, suggesting all have been broken into at some stage. In the echoing downstairs lobby there's a Czech-made Petrof grand piano that has seen better days. I run my fingers over the keys, several of which are stuck.
The three of us take a walk around the Medina, opposite the hotel. This is forbidden: no journalists are supposed to leave the hotel without informing their minders, but we risk it. We go through endless narrow alleyways, glimpsing barber shops, workshops, food shops, more workshops. No one stops to talk or hassle. We end up at Green Square, the scene of the various attempted rebel rallies, which is now full of Gaddafi counter-rallies. It is only here that dark-glassed men ask who we are. Just 48 hours ago I was sitting in a garden in Gloucestershire. Such is the life of a foreign correspondent – now distant in my own past. I am transported back to covering the Iran–Iraq war years ago, and how one day you're living in the civilised norms of north London, the next literally walking through minefields, looking for signs of chemical weapons and dead bodies. Then two days later, you're enjoying a bowl of pasta during a three-hour stopover in Rome, on your way back to north London family life.	The three of us take a walk around the Medina, opposite the hotel. This is forbidden: no journalists are supposed to leave the hotel without informing their minders, but we risk it. We go through endless narrow alleyways, glimpsing barber shops, workshops, food shops, more workshops. No one stops to talk or hassle. We end up at Green Square, the scene of the various attempted rebel rallies, which is now full of Gaddafi counter-rallies. It is only here that dark-glassed men ask who we are. Just 48 hours ago I was sitting in a garden in Gloucestershire. Such is the life of a foreign correspondent – now distant in my own past. I am transported back to covering the Iran–Iraq war years ago, and how one day you're living in the civilised norms of north London, the next literally walking through minefields, looking for signs of chemical weapons and dead bodies. Then two days later, you're enjoying a bowl of pasta during a three-hour stopover in Rome, on your way back to north London family life.
As we walk there is a phone call on Peter's mobile from Saif's chief of staff, Mohammed Ismail. He wants to meet. We then receive another from a woman called Jackie, an American PR from LA who is, incongruously enough, acting for another of Gaddafi's sons, Saadi. Back at the hotel, Jackie arrives first: 31, blonde, smart. It is bizarre stuff as she launches into slick west coast PR shtick on behalf of "my boss".	As we walk there is a phone call on Peter's mobile from Saif's chief of staff, Mohammed Ismail. He wants to meet. We then receive another from a woman called Jackie, an American PR from LA who is, incongruously enough, acting for another of Gaddafi's sons, Saadi. Back at the hotel, Jackie arrives first: 31, blonde, smart. It is bizarre stuff as she launches into slick west coast PR shtick on behalf of "my boss".
Then Mohammed Ismail arrives with Mr Abdulmajeed Ramadan El-Dursi, the chairman of the Foreign Media Authority, Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya – aka head of their foreign press operation.	Then Mohammed Ismail arrives with Mr Abdulmajeed Ramadan El-Dursi, the chairman of the Foreign Media Authority, Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya – aka head of their foreign press operation.
I assume this means the message has got through that an editor-in-chief is in town. We sit in armchairs in the empty marble lobby. Dursi is in his late 60s, tweed jacket, immaculate manners, gentle voice, urbane, quizzical, exhausted. But I suspect Mohammed Ismail will be the key figure in the next 24 hours. He is a different proposition – two-day stubble, handsome, intelligent eyes, but overweight – in jeans, a blue blazer with four brass buttons. And four mobile phones, which he lays out on the table in front of us. All Nokias, two black, one grey, one white. Over the next two hours they keep bursting into life in turn – each with different ringtones. Every time one goes off he stares at the number, rarely answering.	I assume this means the message has got through that an editor-in-chief is in town. We sit in armchairs in the empty marble lobby. Dursi is in his late 60s, tweed jacket, immaculate manners, gentle voice, urbane, quizzical, exhausted. But I suspect Mohammed Ismail will be the key figure in the next 24 hours. He is a different proposition – two-day stubble, handsome, intelligent eyes, but overweight – in jeans, a blue blazer with four brass buttons. And four mobile phones, which he lays out on the table in front of us. All Nokias, two black, one grey, one white. Over the next two hours they keep bursting into life in turn – each with different ringtones. Every time one goes off he stares at the number, rarely answering.
We talk business. Mohammed Ismail promises to return at 10.45am tomorrow and take us to meet Ghaith at 11. He is fine, he says. We can then leave by a flight to Cairo or Casablanca. But we know it's too late for Cairo. The situation is escalating so rapidly that there are now virtually no Egyptian flights in or out of Libya. So it will have to be Casablanca – though that creates its own problems, given Ghaith's Iraqi passport. Peter disappears to start fixing the flight.	We talk business. Mohammed Ismail promises to return at 10.45am tomorrow and take us to meet Ghaith at 11. He is fine, he says. We can then leave by a flight to Cairo or Casablanca. But we know it's too late for Cairo. The situation is escalating so rapidly that there are now virtually no Egyptian flights in or out of Libya. So it will have to be Casablanca – though that creates its own problems, given Ghaith's Iraqi passport. Peter disappears to start fixing the flight.
We then talk about Ghaith in different terms. I sketch him as a human being – irrepressible, human, messy, brilliant. I joke he is as much a problem to us as to them. I want to make them realise they are dealing with flesh and blood. Jackie cuts in: "Gentlemen, what sort of coverage are you planning to give this?" Now that's an LA publicist speaking. I answer honestly: "Ghaith has never been one to write about himself. It's not his style. He doesn't put himself at the heart of the story." I tell them he had been in scrapes twice before and didn't write self-glorifying accounts. Ismail asks, "When?" I have a heart-sinking feeling he is going to Google Ghaith to see if I'm telling the truth.	We then talk about Ghaith in different terms. I sketch him as a human being – irrepressible, human, messy, brilliant. I joke he is as much a problem to us as to them. I want to make them realise they are dealing with flesh and blood. Jackie cuts in: "Gentlemen, what sort of coverage are you planning to give this?" Now that's an LA publicist speaking. I answer honestly: "Ghaith has never been one to write about himself. It's not his style. He doesn't put himself at the heart of the story." I tell them he had been in scrapes twice before and didn't write self-glorifying accounts. Ismail asks, "When?" I have a heart-sinking feeling he is going to Google Ghaith to see if I'm telling the truth.
Jackie says she's keen that everything remains low-key, and Ismail agrees. He evidently wants Ghaith out of the country, problem solved, not hanging around in Tripoli. After an hour it becomes apparent the business is done, but Ismail and Jackie, who are, currently, as close as you can get to the Gaddafi family, stay and keep talking, reasonably openly: they do not, one suspects, want needlessly to make an enemy of the Guardian.	Jackie says she's keen that everything remains low-key, and Ismail agrees. He evidently wants Ghaith out of the country, problem solved, not hanging around in Tripoli. After an hour it becomes apparent the business is done, but Ismail and Jackie, who are, currently, as close as you can get to the Gaddafi family, stay and keep talking, reasonably openly: they do not, one suspects, want needlessly to make an enemy of the Guardian.
After another half-hour or so, they leave. The three of us then go for supper in the empty hotel restaurant, with skeleton staff again. There is distant gunfire. Peter thinks it is probably just "celebrations" in Green Square. The government troops have just taken (we discovered in our meeting) the key town of Ajdabiya. A waiter whispers it is all wrong. "They should not be celebrating killing fellow Libyans."	After another half-hour or so, they leave. The three of us then go for supper in the empty hotel restaurant, with skeleton staff again. There is distant gunfire. Peter thinks it is probably just "celebrations" in Green Square. The government troops have just taken (we discovered in our meeting) the key town of Ajdabiya. A waiter whispers it is all wrong. "They should not be celebrating killing fellow Libyans."
After eating we go up to the roof, where there are a handful of other journalists trying to get satphone connections. We stand on the hotel's incongruous artificial grass lawn listening to the sirens, tracer bullets, automatic fire. Peter pulls us inside: "I've seen these guys shooting. They have no idea where they're aiming."	After eating we go up to the roof, where there are a handful of other journalists trying to get satphone connections. We stand on the hotel's incongruous artificial grass lawn listening to the sirens, tracer bullets, automatic fire. Peter pulls us inside: "I've seen these guys shooting. They have no idea where they're aiming."
Just before I turn in there is a call from Ismail. If we're struggling with finding flights, he thinks the prime minister of Turkey may lay on a private jet. The trip has just become even more surreal. So we could be in Turkey this time tomorrow or Casablanca. If it's Casablanca, movie-loving tradition dictates I must find a piano there and play it.	Just before I turn in there is a call from Ismail. If we're struggling with finding flights, he thinks the prime minister of Turkey may lay on a private jet. The trip has just become even more surreal. So we could be in Turkey this time tomorrow or Casablanca. If it's Casablanca, movie-loving tradition dictates I must find a piano there and play it.
Over the past few months I have been attempting to master Chopin's Ballade No 1 in G minor, Op 23, one of the most daunting pieces in the piano repertoire. Should I ever make a book out of my endeavour, I resolve, I've at least got the title: Play it Again. It has two associations, apart from the possibility that I might be sitting in front of an old upright piano in Casablanca this time tomorrow: returning to the piano as an adult, and the fact that it's only by endless repetition that any progress is made.	Over the past few months I have been attempting to master Chopin's Ballade No 1 in G minor, Op 23, one of the most daunting pieces in the piano repertoire. Should I ever make a book out of my endeavour, I resolve, I've at least got the title: Play it Again. It has two associations, apart from the possibility that I might be sitting in front of an old upright piano in Casablanca this time tomorrow: returning to the piano as an adult, and the fact that it's only by endless repetition that any progress is made.
The journalist in me also likes the fact that it's a misquote. Bogart never said it.	The journalist in me also likes the fact that it's a misquote. Bogart never said it.
It's midnight when I get to bed. Gaddafi is live on TV ranting to a crowd of loyalists.	It's midnight when I get to bed. Gaddafi is live on TV ranting to a crowd of loyalists.
Wednesday 16 March	Wednesday 16 March
I have breakfast with Peter and Ian. There are maybe half a dozen other hotel guests there. As we eat, I spy another hotel Petrof, up on the internal balcony overlooking the restaurant.	I have breakfast with Peter and Ian. There are maybe half a dozen other hotel guests there. As we eat, I spy another hotel Petrof, up on the internal balcony overlooking the restaurant.
I have packed the Ballade score in my bag, we've two hours to kill before Ismail is due to take us to Ghaith, and I have no wish to risk leaving the hotel. I ask a waiter if I can practise on the piano. He seems baffled to be asked, but readily agrees. And so I sit down in Tripoli, in the middle of a civil war, on a ledge above an echoing and virtually deserted restaurant – with just the faintest hint of Frank Sinatra over the muzak system – and play the first few pages of the Chopin Ballade. I see a few faces craning up at me, but soon they go back to their scrambled eggs and grilled tomatoes. This is hardly the craziest thing happening in Tripoli at the moment.	I have packed the Ballade score in my bag, we've two hours to kill before Ismail is due to take us to Ghaith, and I have no wish to risk leaving the hotel. I ask a waiter if I can practise on the piano. He seems baffled to be asked, but readily agrees. And so I sit down in Tripoli, in the middle of a civil war, on a ledge above an echoing and virtually deserted restaurant – with just the faintest hint of Frank Sinatra over the muzak system – and play the first few pages of the Chopin Ballade. I see a few faces craning up at me, but soon they go back to their scrambled eggs and grilled tomatoes. This is hardly the craziest thing happening in Tripoli at the moment.
Ismail arrives, only 15 minutes late, dressed today in washed-out khaki top and black denim trousers. There is a 10-minute drive into the city centre, round windy streets. We draw up at an anonymous building behind a half-built concrete hotel. Where are we? I ask. "A security building."	Ismail arrives, only 15 minutes late, dressed today in washed-out khaki top and black denim trousers. There is a 10-minute drive into the city centre, round windy streets. We draw up at an anonymous building behind a half-built concrete hotel. Where are we? I ask. "A security building."
Waiting for us here is another middle-aged government official, who announces himself as a friend of the British broadcaster Kate Adie – another of the contacts we've rung in the hunt for Ghaith. He tells me he used to be an English professor before he became involved in Libyan government security and foreign relations, and says he has had a hip operation at King Edward VII's Hospital near Harley Street. Who are his favourite English writers? I ask. "Blake," he answers, unhesitatingly. "The more you read, the more complex it is. And Yeats, he's also very complex." He starts quoting passages, to the evident distaste of a shaven-haired, unsmiling Libyan beside him. "What do you do?" I ask this second man. Unsmiling answer: "I'm not a journalist."	Waiting for us here is another middle-aged government official, who announces himself as a friend of the British broadcaster Kate Adie – another of the contacts we've rung in the hunt for Ghaith. He tells me he used to be an English professor before he became involved in Libyan government security and foreign relations, and says he has had a hip operation at King Edward VII's Hospital near Harley Street. Who are his favourite English writers? I ask. "Blake," he answers, unhesitatingly. "The more you read, the more complex it is. And Yeats, he's also very complex." He starts quoting passages, to the evident distaste of a shaven-haired, unsmiling Libyan beside him. "What do you do?" I ask this second man. Unsmiling answer: "I'm not a journalist."
We are soon moved to another room, where we all sit in silence. Then, suddenly, there is Ghaith in the doorway. He is in a cream top, full beard and jeans, a leather bag over his shoulder, as if he'd just been out for a stroll round the market. But he lets out an involuntary gasp when he sees me.	We are soon moved to another room, where we all sit in silence. Then, suddenly, there is Ghaith in the doorway. He is in a cream top, full beard and jeans, a leather bag over his shoulder, as if he'd just been out for a stroll round the market. But he lets out an involuntary gasp when he sees me.
Much hugging follows. Then – soft-spoken, commanding, firm – he thanks everyone. He has been very well treated, he says. No one has laid a finger on him. The assembled Libyans – there are by now maybe 10 of them – look relieved. This is going well; he is saying what they want to hear. (Later Ghaith will write a piece telling of how, during his fortnight in a jail outside Tripoli, he had been interrogated for hours, blindfold and handcuffed, and fell asleep each night in a filthy cell to the sound of his fellow prisoners being beaten and tortured. Still later, he would track down one of his captors to interview him. But, for now, he shares the same aim of getting out of this room – and out of Libya before the shooting starts.)	Much hugging follows. Then – soft-spoken, commanding, firm – he thanks everyone. He has been very well treated, he says. No one has laid a finger on him. The assembled Libyans – there are by now maybe 10 of them – look relieved. This is going well; he is saying what they want to hear. (Later Ghaith will write a piece telling of how, during his fortnight in a jail outside Tripoli, he had been interrogated for hours, blindfold and handcuffed, and fell asleep each night in a filthy cell to the sound of his fellow prisoners being beaten and tortured. Still later, he would track down one of his captors to interview him. But, for now, he shares the same aim of getting out of this room – and out of Libya before the shooting starts.)
I have to sign a release form. Then Ismail suggests we go to his office in another part of town. Of course, we actually want to drive straight to the airport, but for the time being we are the guests of the Libyan state, so this is an offer we cannot politely refuse.	I have to sign a release form. Then Ismail suggests we go to his office in another part of town. Of course, we actually want to drive straight to the airport, but for the time being we are the guests of the Libyan state, so this is an offer we cannot politely refuse.
We drive across the city to Ismail's office. There is a huge TV screen, black sofas, smoothies and flunkies. We are getting impatient, time is burning away. Ismail – now playing the expansive host – is insistent we have to wait for the plane to be ready. We have no idea which plane this is, but it can't be the Morocco flight Ian's been trying to arrange. It seems we are not going to Casablanca, then.	We drive across the city to Ismail's office. There is a huge TV screen, black sofas, smoothies and flunkies. We are getting impatient, time is burning away. Ismail – now playing the expansive host – is insistent we have to wait for the plane to be ready. We have no idea which plane this is, but it can't be the Morocco flight Ian's been trying to arrange. It seems we are not going to Casablanca, then.
Ismail seems oblivious to our growing impatience and keeps talking. He claims that Saif Gaddafi paid Sarkozy €5m [£4m] in backhanders for his election funds. They have documents, he says, receipts – waving in the general direction of filing cabinets in the corner of the room. [Sarkozy later described the claims as "grotesque".] "What do they take us for?" he spits out, denouncing the French as the only country to have recognised the rebels. Peter's phone is out of credit, so I borrow Ismail's to pass on this intelligence, reliable or not, to the foreign desk. The desk responds with the news that some NYT journalists have now been taken. I immediately ring the editor Bill Keller (it must be 5am or so in NY) and hand the phone to Ismail, so they can begin the negotiation. (They were freed a few days later.)	Ismail seems oblivious to our growing impatience and keeps talking. He claims that Saif Gaddafi paid Sarkozy €5m [£4m] in backhanders for his election funds. They have documents, he says, receipts – waving in the general direction of filing cabinets in the corner of the room. [Sarkozy later described the claims as "grotesque".] "What do they take us for?" he spits out, denouncing the French as the only country to have recognised the rebels. Peter's phone is out of credit, so I borrow Ismail's to pass on this intelligence, reliable or not, to the foreign desk. The desk responds with the news that some NYT journalists have now been taken. I immediately ring the editor Bill Keller (it must be 5am or so in NY) and hand the phone to Ismail, so they can begin the negotiation. (They were freed a few days later.)
Eventually our patience – and nerves – run out. Surely the plane is ready now? "Yes, it was here last night," says Ismail, who suddenly waves his hand and dismisses us. "You can go." Was he bored with us? Was he keeping us there simply to feed us the line about Sarko? Another black Audi is laid on to take us to the airport. We are waved through every checkpoint, and pass a huge wall mural of Berlusconi and Gaddafi beaming together in solidarity.	Eventually our patience – and nerves – run out. Surely the plane is ready now? "Yes, it was here last night," says Ismail, who suddenly waves his hand and dismisses us. "You can go." Was he bored with us? Was he keeping us there simply to feed us the line about Sarko? Another black Audi is laid on to take us to the airport. We are waved through every checkpoint, and pass a huge wall mural of Berlusconi and Gaddafi beaming together in solidarity.
At the airport, we are left in a deserted and windowless VIP lounge, anxious, with still no idea of what, if any, arrangements have been made to get us out of the country. Finally we are taken out of the lounge by armed guards and straight on to the runway, on which sits a solitary plane – a private jet. We climb on board and settle into the plush leather seats – yet another layer of incongruity.	At the airport, we are left in a deserted and windowless VIP lounge, anxious, with still no idea of what, if any, arrangements have been made to get us out of the country. Finally we are taken out of the lounge by armed guards and straight on to the runway, on which sits a solitary plane – a private jet. We climb on board and settle into the plush leather seats – yet another layer of incongruity.
But just as the engines start, two suited figures climb into the plane and sit down opposite us – one a crop-haired, tough-looking figure, the other overweight and vaguely sinister. Military intelligence, surely. My heart sinks.	But just as the engines start, two suited figures climb into the plane and sit down opposite us – one a crop-haired, tough-looking figure, the other overweight and vaguely sinister. Military intelligence, surely. My heart sinks.