Islamic State uses British hostage John Cantlieto in video tour of Mosul
A new video shows a British photojournalist held captive by Islamic State giving a stylised media tour of the beleaguered northern Iraqi city of Mosul.
A new video shows a British photojournalist held captive by Islamic State giving a stylised media tour of the beleaguered northern Iraqi city of Mosul, visiting a market, a hospital and even climbing onto a police motorcycle to dispute reports the city's infrastructure has been crippled.
The video, released on Saturday, provides a window on a city that has largely been off-limits to journalists since Islamic State seized control in June, although reports have trickled out from residents and those people who have escaped.
"The media likes to paint a picture of life in the Islamic State as depressed, people walking around as subjugated citizens in chains, beaten down by strict, totalitarian rule," hostage John Cantlie says as he appears to be driving to the souk or market.
"This isn't a city living in fear, as the Western media would have you believe," he says. "This is just a normal city going about its daily business."
The video, which lasts slightly more than eight minutes, is one of a series in which Cantlie, 43, has faulted Western governments while praising Islamic State and their new "caliphate".
It was not immediately clear under what circumstances he made the video.
The date of the recording could not be independently verified, but Cantlie references news reports from autumn and notes the "sunny December weather".
In the video, Cantlie stops at the market, which he describes as "bustling". He notes that the city's merchants, contrary to news reports, have more than a few hours of electricity a day. Later in the video, Cantlie visits a hospital where he says children are being treated for "psychiatric problems as a direct result of bombs and explosions falling from above", a reference to US-led air strikes.
"We're told that just two days ago an ambulance was hit by a bomb or a missile that fell from an aircraft," Cantlie says, standing in the hospital. "Despite these things the doctors are getting what they need and the Islamic State is prevailing.
"They can take it," he says.
Moments later, Cantlie appears standing outside as a plane passes overhead, shouting and apparently mocking Western powers. "Here! Here! Over here! You've come to rescue me again? Do something! Useless! Absolutely useless!" he shouts, waving his arms.
Cantlie, who has been held for two years, appears healthier and cleaner shaven than in the last video, wearing blue jeans and a Western winter coat instead of the black shirt and trousers from the last video.
That outfit had replaced the orange US-style prison jumpsuit that he and other hostages had been forced to wear and that was shown in the earlier videos.
Islamic State releases dozens of Iraqis held over flag burning
The Islamic State jihadist group has freed dozens of men it had seized while searching for people who burned its flag in north Iraq, officials and residents said.
An intelligence officer and a local official said that 162 out of 170 men were released on Saturday after being taken by IS from the villages of al-Shajara and Gharib in Kirkuk province, where two of the jihadist group's flags were torched.
A 39-year-old from al-Shajara who was among those detained said that they were taken by pickup truck to an area where they were bound and questioned.
