Smuggled diary reveals plight of tourist hostages

Amid signs yesterday that the Muslim rebels holding 21 people hostage on the Philippines island of Jolo are dug in for a long haul, one hostage has given an insight into conditions inside the camp as well as the group's fears and privations.

Risto Vahanen, one of the two Finns held, described being caught in crossfire between the guerrillas and government troops last week. "The fight we had was really frightening... due to heavy shooting, stray bullets and bombs which exploded quite near to us," he said. "We all fear a renewal of this."

His journal came to The Independent via Rauli Virtanen, a Finnish television journalist, who travelled to Jolo and persuaded a mediator to take a notebook to the hostages, empty but for a list of questions.

Mr Vahanen filled the diary between 1 May and 6 May and it was smuggled out by a Filipino doctor who was allowed to visit the hostages. A picture of routine against a background of fear emerges from the diary.

The former scout leader wrote that the day would start with a 5.30am wake-up. Breakfast would be had at 7am followed up by "washing up in the nearby river" and "waiting". At 1pm the hostages would have a lunch of "rice and French survival kit supplies". There was "usually a heavy rain" at 2pm. The sun would set at 6pm when they would have a dinner. At 8pm they would be "trying to sleep in the cold and damp". The hostages - also including nine Malaysians, two Filipinos, three Germans, a French couple, two South Africans and a Lebanese woman - had been treated, he wrote, "in a most decent and friendly way". But he added: "We have lost what is most precious for us, our freedom, in a struggle that is no matter of ours. What has been done to us cannot be justified."

Government negotiators again failed yesterday to make contact with the rebels from Abu Sayyaf, one of two militias waging an armed struggle for an independent Islamic state. The delay led to the kidnappers postponing their decision on whether to release one of the Germans, Renate Wallert, who suffers from high blood pressure and is in poor health.

Mr Vahanen said captivity had been "mentally very difficult" for the hostages, who were taken from a Malaysian island off Borneo nearly three weeks ago. "First days we were under a shock, not quite realising what had happened, and why, to us. Little by little, we have learned to live day by day, hoping for a quick release.

"The beauty of the nature and support from each other gives us strength to come through this experience, if it didn't take too long. Tomorrow is our 14th day in captivity, and we all expect to be released early next week. If this doesn't take place, the spirit will be really low, leading to more mental suffering," he wrote.

The Finn said that at their first hideout, the group had been short of drinking water. They had lived off rainwater and rice, and everyone had suffered from diarrhoea.

Then came "the battle" on 2 May, during which four "hand grenades or bombs" landed near them. "We had a narrow escape, but our hosts did everything to bring us out of the fire unharmed," he said.

At their present camp, they had plenty of fresh water and stomach problems had eased. Their greatest fear now was catching malaria. "The nights are very cold, and clothing is not sufficient," Mr Vahanen wrote. "We have made a shelter, so we manage with the rain."

He appealed to the international community to persuade the Manila government to withdraw its troops and concluded: "We are all in good shape, but for Renate."

The rebels have yet to make concrete demands.