January 4, 2009
José Cendon, freelance
ABDUCTED
Freeman, a British foreign correspondent for London’s Sunday Telegraph, and Cendon, a Spanish freelance photojournalist, were released January 4 after four weeks in captivity, according to multiple reports.
Kidnappers held them in a mountainous region 20 miles (30 kilometers) outside of Puntland’s port city of Bossasso, according to local journalists and the Daily Telegraph. They were not harmed.
Freeman and Cendon were abducted after leaving their Bossasso hotel in late November. They were on assignment for London’s Daily Telegraph, reporting on piracy in the Gulf of Aden region.
Original reports said Freeman and Cendon were captured along with two Somali journalists, Awale Jama and Muktar Said. But Freeman and local journalists alleged that the two Somalis were actually conspirators in the kidnapping. Jama and Said were not immediately arrested and had dropped from public sight, local journalists told CPJ.