Freed hostage makes low-key return

Published on Saturday 2 January 2010 18:54

FREED hostage Peter Moore was back home with his family yesterday beginning his return to normal life.

The computer expert was reunited with his loved ones following a two-and-a-half year kidnap ordeal in Iraq.

Moore, 36, from Lincoln, was seized along with his four British bodyguards by militants posing as police at Baghdad's finance ministry in May 2007.

He was finally released on Wednesday following lengthy negotiations. Moore spent a quiet New Year's Eve at the British embassy in Baghdad before flying back to the UK.

He touched down at RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire shortly after 5pm on Friday where he was met by Foreign Office officials and taken to be reunited with his family.

Moore's return to the UK was veiled in secrecy following a request for privacy from his family, who are believed to have asked for a "period of decompression", enabling Moore to ease himself gently back into normal life.

In a statement issued by the Foreign Office, Moore's step-parents, Fran and Pauline Sweeney, said: "We are thrilled to have Peter back safely. We have a lot of catching up to do and would like to have time with Peter on our own."

The bodies of three of Moore's bodyguards – Alec MacLachlan, 30, from Llanelli, South Wales; Jason Swindlehurst, 38, from Skelmersdale, Lancashire; and Jason Creswell, 39, originally from Glasgow – were passed to UK authorities last year. A fourth bodyguard, Alan McMenemy, 34, from Glasgow, is also believed to have been killed.

Moore's safe return comes as families of the hostages continued to question the role the government played in securing their release.

It was widely reported that Moore and his bodyguards were taken over the border into Iran following their kidnap, where they were allegedly held by the country's Revolutionary Guard.

General David Petraeus, the head of US Central Command and former commander of American forces in Iraq, said: "I am on the record as having said that our intelligence assessment is that he certainly spent part of the time, at the very least, in Iran, part of the time he was a hostage."

But the Foreign Office insisted there was nothing to back up the claims.

It also denied that Moore was released as part of a prisoner exchange deal.