'My time in the lair of dictator Saddam Hussein'

A Shropshire woman today relived her horror - two decades after begging Saddam Hussein to free her husband who was being held hostage by the Iraqi dictator.

Twenty years ago Eunice Rowley's husband Robert was in Kuwait on business when he was taken hostage by the invading Iraqi army. Mrs Rowley, of Much Wenlock, flew to Iraq and met Hussein in one of his Baghdad palaces.

Mr Rowley was in Kuwait on business in July 1990 and due to fly home on August 2 — the day Iraq invaded Kuwait City.

He was staying in a hotel two miles from Kuwait City where he said he could see bombing and fighting.

The next day, he said, Iraqi guards banged on his bedroom door with rifles and he and other Westerners were ordered to go to reception, during which time he said a guard pointed a gun at him.

He was held for four mo- nths and moved from one installation to another in the dead of night.

He returned to England in November 1990 after his wife, along with the wives of other hostages, defied Foreign Office advice and flew to Iraq to meet Hussein.

Mrs Rowley said she remembers how she felt at the time: "We were all very, very angry, and I think it made us more determined to go."

She soon realised hostage negotiation was anything but straightforward. But after three weeks in Baghdad Saddam Hussein agreed to meet her.

She said she was then driven under armed guard to his palace — where she came face to face with the Iraqi dictator and secured her husband's release.

Now 65, Mr Rowley is enj- oying retirement in Much Wenlock but Mrs Rowley still feels let down by the British Government. "I always thought officialdom would be there but they were not," she said. "I never th- ought we would fail. Never."

Mr Rowley said his ordeal, saw him forced to live at power stations as part of Hussein's human shield to prevent bombing.

He a lost a stone in weight through stress and anxiety.

Mrs Rowley will tell her story on Monday's Inside Out programme on BBC One at 7.30pm.