Darkness, Rain Help American Escape Captors

An American tourist kidnapped while hiking in Kashmir said Sunday that darkness and rain allowed him to slip away from the separatist rebels who had captured him.

“I took advantage of darkness and bad weather,” John Childs said in an interview in Srinagar, where he had been flown after hiking through the mountains to safety. “I was not released; I escaped.”

Childs, of Simsbury, Conn., was kidnapped Tuesday evening along with another American and two Britons by Muslim militants of Al-Faran, a little-known group fighting for Kashmir’s independence from India.

Childs said the three others still were being held when he escaped, but he refused to give other details for fear of endangering them. They include Donald Fred Hutchings of Spokane.

In a statement released Sunday, the militants threatened to “take an extreme step” unless the Indian government releases 21 jailed Kashmiri rebels by July 15. They also demanded an immediate end to what they termed “genocide of Muslims” by the military. “Accept our demands or face dire consequences,” the group said in its statement. “We are fighting against anti-Islamic forces.”

Childs said he had not been injured by his captors and had suffered only a few bruises on his feet while hiking to safety after his escape Saturday.

Lt. Gen. D.D. Saklani, a top security adviser, told journalists Sunday that he and a police officer had rescued Childs in a helicopter about 15 hours after his escape.

To avoid being captured again by the rebels, Childs climbed up the 14,000-foot mountain range.

“At about 5 p.m., we saw a person waving at us on a steep hill,” Saklani said. “We went down as low as 50 feet and told him in sign language to shift to an area where we could land.”