Forbidden to move or make noise, a Japanese hostage tells the Syrian ordeal

For 40 months of captivity at the hands of Syrian militants, the Japanese journalist Jumpei Yasuda has no right to move or make noise, even asleep. The guards told him every day that he would be released or given him canned food, but no telltale.

Yasuda, who arrived in Japan on Thursday after more than three years of what he called "hell" physical and psychological, told the Daily Asahi, Shimbun accuses him of to be a spy.

Confined for eight months in a space 1.5 meters high and one meter wide, he was not allowed to bathe, wash clothes and make noise .

"Because I could not wash my hair, I had my itchy head – but when I scratched, it made noise," he told Asahi at the time. his flight back to Japan. "Breathe through the nose, break the joints of the fingers, move while I slept – everything was forbidden."

The strict control of his daily life tightened even more after he was accused of "espionage" while making some noise by relieving himself.

At one point, he did not eat for 20 days to avoid any movement.

"I had skin and bones, horribly nauseated.If it had lasted longer, I would probably have died, but I was finally transferred to a different place", a- he declared. "They would not bring me food or, if they gave me canned food, they would not bring can openers."

A week before his release, he was relocated into the narrow space of his worst days, then into a cell of what appeared to be an ordinary house.

The next day he was driven into a car and driven. at the Turkish border.

Gaunt and bearded, dressed in a black t-shirt and dark pants, Yasuda smiled at the press when he arrived in Japan but said nothing.

His wife said at a press conference that any further comment He should wait until he has rested and that he has submitted to medical examinations .

"I am happy to be able to return to Japan At the same time, I do not know what will happen or what I should do," Yasuda told Reuters his Turkish domestic flight before returning from Istanbul .

The Japanese government thanked Qatar and Turkey for their cooperation in the release of Yasuda, but refused to pay a ransom for his release.

© (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2018.