FREEDOM

Lynsey Addario and Fellow Kidnapped New York Journalists Share Stories

Captors told one, "You're going to die tonight."

The Libyan government freed four New York Times journalists on Monday, six days after they were captured—and they have provided harrowing tales from their imprisonment. Anthony Shadid, Tyler Hicks, Lynsey Addario and Stephen Farrell said they were covering fighting near Ajdabiyah when their driver accidentally drove into a checkpoint manned by Col. Muammar Gaddafi’s forces. Although the guards hesitated to kill the journalists because they are American, the soldiers still hit and threatened them; Addario said she was punched in the face and one soldier “was caressing my head in this sick way, this tender way, saying ‘You’re going to die tonight.’” The group was held in a squalid cell and, on one night, the back of a vehicle. But even after their release, there is still cause for concern: Their driver is still missing.