A new six-part documentary series, which looks at the dramatic stories of Irish people who were kidnapped or taken hostage both in Ireland and abroad, kicks off this Sunday, 8th June at 7pm.
The series, produced by RTÉ Television Archive Unit between June and December 2008, was directed and produced by Janet Gallagher and re-visits the harrowing experiences these Irish people went through, by using first hand accounts, eye-witness interviews, archive footage and re-construction.
“It was fascinating and frightening to hear what some of these people had suffered,” Janet Gallagher told IFTN. “Their experiences were quite traumatic but they have come through it and lived to tell the tale. Some of the stories also occurred at the time of major historical events, for example the beginning of the Gulf War and the Ethiopian famine.”
The first programme in the series, which was edited by Liz Walsh, follows Aidan Walsh, former Deputy Head of the UN Relief and Works Agency in Lebanon, who was kidnapped in Beirut and held hostage for 37 hours in 1985. Author Robert Fisk, one of the first people to meet Walsh on his release, is also interviewed.
The remaining five episodes look at a range of stories that hit the Irish headlines in the past, including the kidnapping of Lord and Lady Donoughmore from their Clonmel home in 1974; the case of two Irish nurses who were held hostage for a month in 1988 while working with Concern in Ethiopia; and the story of a doctor and electrical contractor who were found themselves trapped between borders when Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait in 1990.
‘Hostage’ kicks off at 7.00pm on Sunday 8th June, on RTÉ One
