‘I’m just glad it’s all over and I’m very glad to be back’

THE Irish Red Cross worker who was kidnapped in Ethiopia said he could not have been mistaken for an oil worker.

Donal O Suilleabhain, 41, from Co Sligo, was released having been held for a week.

Still very shaken from his ordeal, he was safely in Addis Ababa, yesterday, where he was preparing for his return home.

He and an Ethiopian colleague were abducted about 31 miles outside Gode town in the Ogaden region on Monday last week.

The pair had been travelling in a convoy of Red Cross vehicles which were stopped by an armed gang.

Mr O Suilleabhain, a water and sanitation engineer, has been working with the International Red Cross for several years.

At the time of his abduction he had been travelling in clearly marked vehicles, he stated yesterday.

“The Red Cross is well-known in the area and we have been working with local communities there for several years.

“We tried to explain who we were and what projects we were working on for the Red Cross, the nature of the Red Cross organisation and the benefits of what we were doing for the people in the area.”

Nonetheless his captors marched him off into the bush.

“It was quite tense at the beginning, so it was very difficult to get a sense of where they were coming from and we really only realised at the end that there was this issue about the oil workers,” he said.

Speaking 24 hours after being set free he said he was incredibly relieved.

” I’m just glad it’s all over and I’m very glad to be back.”

Neither he nor his colleague were harmed in any way, he said.

“Despite the fact that we were forcibly taken, I’m physically fine and mentally fine. There was no violence used against either of us. We were both treated well.

“We were fed and provided with water and given cups of tea to keep us going,” he said.

Their captors had completely concealed anything that might give a clue to their identities.

“They never gave us any personal information about themselves at all, although I told them quite a bit about myself and my parents back home in Ireland just to try to establish some kind of personal rapport with them, because of the very tense situation we found ourselves in,” he said.

He had been working in Ethiopia for just one month when he was kidnapped.

“I don’t think it’s possible for me to stay in Ethiopia after everything that has happened. To be honest, I’m sorry to leave as this is a great country and the people here are very nice, but that’s the way it is.

“As for my future plans, right now my priority is my parents; they have been through a terrible ordeal and I really would never want them to go through anything like this again.

“I will try to get home as soon as I possibly can, and, when I do, I really want it to be a quiet affair, so that I can spend some time with my family,” he added.