Yvonne Ridley (born 23 April 1958) is a British journalist and Respect Party activist best known for her capture by the Taliban and subsequent conversion to Islam after release. Yvonne Ridley has, among others, worked for Press TV news channel.
Yvonne Ridley attended the London College of Printing. As a journalist, she has written for The Sunday Times, The Independent on Sunday, The Observer, The Mirror and the News of the World. She was deputy editor of Wales on Sunday and was chief reporter when the Sunday Express sent her to Afghanistan after 9/11 event.
She has also delivered lectures on issues relating to Iraq, Israel, Afghanistan, Chechnya, Kashmir and Uzbekistan, Women in Islam, the War on Terror and journalism at universities across the United States of America, Australia, South Africa and the Middle East. She has written two books called In The Hands of the Taliban and Ticket to Paradise.
Yvonne Ridley is a patron of the UK-based pressure groups Cage-prisoners, the European President of the International Muslim Women's Union and the Vice President of the European Muslim League based in Milan and Geneva. She is a member of the Stop the War Coalition, at whose rallies she has spoken, and the Respect Party, for whom she has stood in parliamentary elections.
Yvonne Ridley : "... They were bombing and decimating the population for reasons only known to the USA and its Allies. The poor Taliban had no idea why America wished to invade Afghanistan. They had heard of this as a 'mishap' but had no idea of the enormity of the tragedy. They did not know of the complexity of the buildings and people jumping out of towers 100 stories high, as they did not have TV's nor did they know a tower when they were told about it..."
BE INSPIRED, AS YVONNE RIDLEY, A PASSIONATE BRITISH JOURNALIST, DESCRIBES THE STORY OF HOW SHE WAS HELD CAPTIVE BY TALIBAN SOLDIERS IN AFGHANISTAN.
INTIMIDATED BY THEIR PRESENCE, SHE PERSISTED WITH GREAT FIGHTING ZEAL TO RETURN HOME TO HER AWAITING FAMILY. SIT WITH HER IN INTERROGATIONS, WAR TORN AFGHAN JAIL FACILITIES AND THEN SHED TEARS OF SORROW AND JOY AS THIS TOUCHING STORY UNFOLDS. JOIN HER AS SHE CHALLENGES TALIBAN SOLDIERS AND FALSELY LABELED "TERRORISTS"; ONLY TO LATER FALL IN LOVE WITH THEIR CHARACTER, MORALITY, FAITH, COMPASSION, RESPECT AND WAY OF LIFE.
INDULGE YOURSELF IN AN UNTAINTED DEPICTION OF THE TRUE STORY OF AFGHANISTAN AND THE REAL WAR ON TERROR - IN THE EYES OF A WESTERN BORN JOURNALIST WHO WAS IN SEARCH OF THE TRUTH, AND FOUND IT, IN ISLAM... "IN THE HANDS OF THE TALIBAN."
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