Yvonne Ridley

Yvonne Ridley (born 23 April 1958) is a British journalist, author and politician who holds several committee positions with the Alba Party in Scotland.

She was a former chair of the National Council of the now-defunct Respect Party.

Ridley made global headlines when she was captured by the Taliban in 2001 after the events of 9/11 and before the start of the U.S.-led war.

Two years later she converted to Islam.

She is a vocal supporter of Palestine, which she took up as a schoolgirl in her native County Durham.

She is an avid critic of Zionism and of Western media portrayals and foreign policy in the War on Terror, and has undertaken speaking tours throughout the Muslim world as well as America, Europe and Australia.

Ridley was captured by the Taliban in Afghanistan on 28 September 2001, and held for 11 days, while working for the Sunday Express.

In the days before the beginning of the US-led invasion of Afghanistan, after being refused an entrance visa, she decided to follow the example of BBC reporter John Simpson, who had crossed the border anonymously in a burqa.

She entered on 26 September and spent two days undercover in Afghanistan.

It was on her return, travelling with her guides, that she was uncovered when the donkey she was on bolted, and her camera was seen by a Taliban soldier.

She was accused of being a spy, which carried a death sentence, and at the very least faced jail for illegally entering Afghanistan.

The publisher of Express Newspapers, Richard Desmond, sent a team of negotiators to talk directly with Taliban officials at the Afghan embassy in Islamabad, Pakistan.

It soon became clear the regime wanted neither money nor aid but proof that Ridley was a bonafide journalist.

The British high commissioner to Pakistan, Hilary Synnott, met the Afghan ambassador in Islamabad, Mullah Abdul Salam Zaeef, and asked for her release.

Following her release on 8 October, Ridley was escorted to the border, where she was handed over to the Pakistani authorities.

It had been feared that this would be jeopardised by the bombing of Afghan targets as part of the War in Afghanistan that had commenced the previous day.

Ridley revealed that she had kept a concealed diary inside a box for a toothpaste tube and inside of a soap wrapper.

She had been on hunger strike throughout her captivity and described her experience as terrifying but she was not physically hurt.

After her release, her guides Jan Ali and Nagibullah Muhmand, as well as his five-year-old daughter Basmena, were held in prison in Kabul.

At least three of Muhmand's relatives were also arrested for aiding Ridley after the Taliban developed the film in her camera.

All were subsequently released without charge or harm.

Ridley had made several public pleas, including one via the BBC's Pashto and Persian Service, urging the Taliban to release the prisoners on the same humanitarian grounds the regime had shown her.

She said later she was careful not to refer directly to the men as her guides as they had previously agreed not to admit any involvement in the event of capture.

Her passion for left-wing, anti-imperialist causes predates her conversion; she joined the Labour Party as a teenager before resigning over the decision to invade Iraq in March 2003.

She converted to Islam in the middle of 2003, claiming that her new faith helped put behind her broken marriages and embrace "the biggest and the best family in the world."

She has been called "something close to a celebrity in the Islamic world" by the journalist Rachel Cooke, and in 2008 was voted the "most recognisable woman in the Islamic world" by Islam Online.

Ridley was born in the working class mining town of Stanley, County Durham, the youngest of three girls, and had an upbringing in the Church of England.

She began her career at the local Stanley News, which was part of the Durham Advertiser Series.

From there she moved to Newcastle upon Tyne and worked for The Sunday Sun and the Newcastle Journal for Thomson Regional Newspapers as well as The Northern Echo which was part of the Westminster Press group.

She attended the London College of Printing.

As a journalist, she was employed by The Sunday Times, The Independent on Sunday, The Observer, the Daily Mirror and the News of the World.

She was deputy editor and acting editor of Wales on Sunday, and was chief reporter when the Sunday Express sent her to Afghanistan after 9/11.

In one interview she mentions having "a reputation as the 'Patsy Stone of Fleet Street'" that she was happy to have left behind with her conversion to Islam.

In March 2020, in recognition of her humanitarian work in the field of journalism, she was awarded an honorary doctorate at the International Academy of Diplomatic Action in Bern, Switzerland.

She said in her book, In the Hands of the Taliban, that, while she was in captivity, she was treated with respect by the men of the Taliban and was, subsequently, amazed by their courtesy.

All men that she came in contact with lowered their gazes (to her), which left her bewildered.

She had initially thought they had already decided to have her executed and therefore could not look her in the eyes.

Only later did she discover they were showing her a sign of respect.

While in captivity she gave an undertaking to read the Qur'an and study Islam if they let her go.

Fulfilling the promise and setting out on what she described as "an academic exercise" she said she was shocked to discover "the Quran makes it clear that women are equal in spirituality, worth, and education. What everyone forgets is that Islam is perfect; people are not."