Alberta journalist Amanda Lindhout and Australian Nigel Brennan have been held captive in Somalia for 11 months
The family of Australian photojournalist Nigel Brennan, who along with Red Deer, Alta. freelance writer Amanda Lindhout has been held hostage in war-torn Somalia since last August, has begun speaking out about the failure of the Australian and Canadian governments to secure his release. “We are just desperate to get some answers from our government,” a family spokeswoman told the Australian Broadcasting Corp. “What do they think is a reasonable time for an Australian citizen to be held captive?” The Lindhout family, meanwhile, remains silent—for good reason, say Australian government officials. “Our advice has always been not to go public, not to go to the media,” Australian foreign minister Stephen Smith told a reporter. Kevin Rudd, Australia’s prime minister, described the situation as “an exceptionally complex matter, and I think if you were fully apprised, confidentially, of the details of the case… you’d be fully seized of how difficult and complex a matter this is, given the part of the world in which he is located.”