Salon | Newsreal

SALON | CONTACT US | ARCHIVED ARTICLES | TABLE TALK

T   H   E       K   I   D   N   A   P       B   U   S   I   N   E   S   S

With 200 foreign nationals kidnapped a year, ransoming executives is a boom industry.

BY TIM WALL

“we know 'Jose's' style," Chris Marquet says. "We have a history on him, we've dealt with him before. He knows our people, and he trusts them."

Marquet heads the risk assessment division of Kroll Associates, a leading international security firm. "Jose" is a code name for one of the kidnappers of foreign nationals with which firms like Kroll Associates negotiate ransom deals on a regular basis.

Kidnap prevention and hostage-release services are growth enterprises. A number of these services are on retainer with major insurance companies -- primarily AIG, the Chubb Group and Lloyd's of London -- whose employees are getting sore fingers from writing policies to pay ransoms, and have set up departments with names like Chubb's "Kidnap/Ransom and Extortion Insurance." On the other side are the kidnappers, consummate professionals who are skilled in surveillance techniques, communications, logistics and command control, as well as weaponry.

"It's strictly a business for the experienced groups in Latin America; they don't want to harm the victim," Marquet said. "You play the game, the guy's going to come back."

Kroll Associates handles up to 40 kidnaps of corporate managers a year. At one point recently, Kroll was negotiating nine cases simultaneously, according to Marquet. Based on records of its own cases and others that come to its attention, Kroll estimates that in the 1990s an average of 200 abductions of foreign nationals take place every year. The number of local magnates kidnapped by groups of the same national origin is 10 times that.

London-based Control Risks Group, the other major player in the international security field, puts the average initial demand for returning abducted North American, European and Japanese executives at $2 million. The final payment, after negotiations, according to Control Risk's database, is often closer to $500,000. Japanese executives are the most valued target, according to Control Risk's assessment. Ransoms occasionally run much higher: An estimated $30 million was paid to Mexican kidnappers of a Mexican banker two years ago, and last year German kidnappers got away with $20 million after abducting a Dutch millionaire.

"At what point in the negotiations does someone decide that the hostage's life just isn't worth the price?" I asked David Lattin, a Control Risks executive. Lattin, a low-key, tweedy sort reminiscent of John Le Carré's George Smiley, patiently explained that it doesn't work that way. Based on past deals, there is a known range within which the eventual price will be agreed upon, depending on the caliber of the executive, his or her country of origin and the type of kidnapper. Even if the initial counter-offer, say $100,000, is far below the initial demand, it suffices to keep the negotiations going. The kidnappers, if they possess any degree of professionalism, are not going to throw away $100,000 for the fleeting pleasure of slitting someone's throat.

Similarly, the corporation that employs the hostage is not likely to scrimp, even if the abductee is not insured. "If they don't get the branch manager back, who are they going to convince to be the new branch manager?" Lattin asked.

The important thing is to keep the negotiations going, Lattin says, communicating with the captors with phrases like "I'm sure we can reach an agreement that is beneficial to all concerned."

Marquet, who joined Kroll Associates straight out of business school, says some groups will pursue unreasonable demands, "and then you're in for a more protracted, white-knuckled negotiation." Mike Ackerman, an ex-CIA agent who runs his own Miami-based firm, also has noted some failings in professional etiquette, such as "double-dipping" -- making a new demand after an agreed-upon ransom was paid.

"When I started 20 years ago, you could pretty much rely on kidnappers to keep their word," Ackerman growled in a telephone interview. "Now you can't even trust kidnappers anymore." In Colombia, the world capital of kidnapping, "ELN (National Liberation Army, a guerrilla group) doesn't double-dip; FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) does."

The average amount of time a kidnap victim from a Western country is held is 61 days, according to the Control Risks database. But even when negotiations go smoothly, being held hostage is a grueling ordeal. "Criminal groups are inclined to put you in a little hidden room in a house in a slum area," said Ackerman. Accommodations provided by political organizations are likely to be more gracious, especially if the group controls territory. But in that case, they do not have to worry about being found. So time becomes a negotiating tactic, and the length of the hostage's stay can easily extend past a year.

After Colombia, the highest incidence of kidnapping of foreign nationals occurs in Mexico, Brazil, Guatemala, Somalia and the Philippines. Strictly local abductions are more common in Pakistan and Afghanistan. In many of these countries, a guerrilla war has recently been settled or local Mafia groups broken up, leaving trained, often ruthless men with time on their hands and with little prospect for earning an honest living. In Guatemala, kidnap-for-ransom practitioners are likely to be former security forces and death-squad types who used to hunt guerrillas in the hills. In Mexico, the Popular Revolutionary Army, which surfaced late last year in the state of Oaxaca, told journalists that kidnapping is a standard fund-raising tactic. Past and present Mexican police are widely believed to be in the kidnap business as well. In Peru, some analysts believe the storming of the Japanese embassy by the Tupac Amaru group was financed, in part, by the $1.2 million ransom paid for the return of a Bolivian cement magnate. Bolivian police arrested members of the Tupac Amaru group in the case.

With multinational corporations forging into new terrain, and no shortage of ruthless veterans of brush-fire wars in various corners of the world, Kroll Associates and Control Risks are likely to be in business for a while.

Tim Wall is a United Nations official working on human rights and public information issues.