Freed hostage craves beer and football

Australia’s prime minister hailed the rescue of countryman Douglas Wood from insurgents in Iraq as a miracle, and his family today said he was in high spirits. He asked for a beer and news of his favourite Australian Rules Football team.

Wood has not lived in Australia for years. He’s a US resident married to a Californian woman, but has remained loyal to his team from the southern city of Geelong where he grew up.

At an emotional news conference in Canberra, two of his brothers, Malcolm and Vernon, described their first telephone conversations with their older brother since his dramatic rescue yesterday following 47 days as a captive of Iraqi insurgents.

“Doug sounded remarkably composed,” said Malcolm Wood, 57. “He asked me whether the Geelong Cats would win the premiership this year.”

Douglas Wood, a 64-year-old engineer, was recovering in Baghdad after being held for more than six weeks by insurgents who kicked him in the head, shaved his hair and demanded Australia remove its 1,400 troops from Iraq.

One of his first questions to Australia’s counter-terrorism chief Nick Warner, who headed Australia’s six-week quest to secure the engineer’s release, was whether he had any beer.

Prime Minister John Howard, who refused to bend to kidnappers’ demands and ruled out paying ransom, hailed the successful Iraqi and US army mission to free Wood as “a miracle”.

Howard told parliament he had telephoned Iraqi Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari to thank him and to promise Australian troops would remain in Iraq until their job was completed.

Iraqi troops, with some assistance from US forces, liberated him yesterday from his captors in Ghazaliya, one of the most dangerous Sunni Arab neighbourhoods of Baghdad.

Wood’s brothers said they were overwhelmed when Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer phoned to tell them the news.

“We’ve had our big ups and downs. I think I’ve cried more since Doug was released than when he was captured,” Vernon, 62, said. “It’s an overwhelming letting go that’s taken us by storm.”

When the emotions settle, the family said it will plead with Wood, the second oldest of four brothers, to leave Iraq, where he has worked as a self-employed contractor for more than a year.

“It’s too early to push those types of lines,” Vernon said. “He’s more interested in football and beer.”

The family said they still planned to make good on an offer to make a charitable donation to an Iraqi cause.

“We always had strong ethical difficulties with paying a ransom. That’s partly why early on we made an offer to make a charitable donation,” Malcolm said.

He still shied away from condemning his brother’s kidnappers.

“It is not possible to hate,” he said. “You do not know the people. You cannot quite understand them.”

Wood’s wife and daughter in America were overjoyed at the news, Malcolm said.

Howard said Wood verified his identity to liberators by answering a so-called “proof-of-life” question, telling them the name of the family’s pet bulldog in the 1950s: Monty.

Howard said Wood was lucky, considering that few of the many hostages taken in Iraq had been rescued.

“Mr Wood must have a guardian angel. He is very lucky,” Howard said. “It is a miracle he’s been released.”

Downer said a “crucial intelligence tip-off” led troops to the house where Wood was captive. A gunfight ensued but no one was injured, Downer said.

Downer told parliament that Wood would leave Iraq sometime today for an undisclosed location in the Middle East.

Wood was abducted in late April. A militant group calling itself the Shura Council of the Mujahedeen of Iraq released a DVD on May 1 showing him pleading for Australia to withdraw its 1,400 troops from Iraq.

Video images released several days later showed him with a shaved head and a black eye, suggesting he had been beaten.

Brian Cook of the Geelong Cats said the team will grant Wood a lifetime membership to honour his devotion to the team.

Now the freed hostage wants just one more thing: his hair to grow back.

“He also joked that he had not liked his last haircut,” Malcolm said.