Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Der Spiegel magazine said it spoke to the man and woman, which it named as Juergen K. and Sabine M., by mobile telephone. It quoted them as saying they were being held in the bush by between 40 and 50 Somalis who were demanding a ransom.
They appealed to the German embassy to do more to secure their release, the magazine reported.
Juergen K. said they had wanted to sail to Thailand but had been seized off the coast of Yemen then taken to Somalia by speedboat, a trip of around two days, when the kidnappers realised there was not much of value on their yacht.
"We didn't have a lot of money and so they didn't find much," Sabine M. told Der Spiegel, which said it had managed to get through to the pair via an intermediary.
"But the kidnappers didn't believe us," she added. "They wrapped a sail around Juergen's neck and wanted to hang him. I put myself in the way and said they should shoot both of us."
Juergen K. said the pair were both ill and he was unable to take his diabetes insulin due to a lack of syringes. His partner now weighed just 40 kg (88 lbs) having lost 20 kg, he added.
"We have fever and severe diarrhoea," he said, adding that they were given only one or two slices of bread a day. Temperatures reached 47 degrees Celsius (117 degrees Fahrenheit) during the day and it was "bitterly cold" at night, he added.
He said he feared the kidnappers would simply shoot the hostages in the legs and leave them in the ant-infested bush, and that he had been beaten in the face with rifle butts.
Asked what help they hoped for, Juergen K. said: "That the public is informed and the embassy does more for us."
He said the kidnappers had not wanted to hold them for long and were impatient for their ransom money.
"They don't like it that it's taking so long," he said. "When we were talking by telephone to the embassy they shot over our heads."
An official said earlier on Tuesday that Somali pirates had seized a small yacht carrying a German family of three and a French captain and had held them since June 23.
"The child is said to have contracted malaria and the dad is diabetic and has no access to insulin," said Andrew Mwangura, director of the Seafarers Assistance Programme, in a statement.
It was not immediately clear whether the statement was referring to Juergen K. and Sabine M. (Reporting by Iain Rogers; Editing by Catherine Evans)
Source: Reuter, July 22, 2008