{"id":23391,"date":"2014-08-24T16:38:17","date_gmt":"2014-08-24T08:38:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=23391"},"modified":"2014-08-24T16:38:17","modified_gmt":"2014-08-24T08:38:17","slug":"montreal-photographer-denies-inadvertently-aiding-militants-in-syrian-abduction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2014\/08\/24\/montreal-photographer-denies-inadvertently-aiding-militants-in-syrian-abduction\/","title":{"rendered":"Montreal photographer denies inadvertently aiding militants in Syrian abduction"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"photographer\"<\/a><\/p>\n

TORONTO — A Montreal photographer is speaking out after a U.S. news website accused him of inadvertently playing a role in the capture of American journalist Steven Sotloff in Syria last year.<\/p>\n

Yves Choquette says he’s the freelance photographer anonymously referred to as “Alex” in a controversial report published Friday on The Daily Beast.<\/p>\n

The report alleges the photographer identified his local Syrian guide, commonly called a fixer, to suspected militant Syrians on Facebook.<\/p>\n

It says that may have compromised the safety of the American journalist, who worked with the same fixer days later.<\/p>\n

Choquette denies the allegations, which he says distort the events of August 2013 and unfairly suggest he’s to blame for the kidnapping.<\/p>\n

He says he sought out advice from journalists on a private online group called The Vulture Club in an attempt to find a reliable fixer.<\/p>\n

The online report says the photographer contacted up to 30 Syrians on Facebook, choosing those who were shown in pictures holding guns and opposition flags, in his search for a fixer to guide him across the Syrian border from Kilis, Turkey.<\/p>\n

In an interview with The Canadian Press, Choquette called the report a personal attack “not based on any proof on any real fact” and accused its author, Ben Taub, of making up much of its contents.<\/p>\n

“I’m not an adrenaline junkie, I’m 55. I’m not stupid, I prepared this for months and I want to be sure that I do it the safest way that I can,” he said Saturday.<\/p>\n

Choquette admits he was inexperienced in the region and it was his first attempt at entering Syria, but said he heeded other journalists’ warnings about the risks involved.<\/p>\n

Only the fixer, the online group, Taub and two other local journalists knew of his plans, he said.<\/p>\n

“Everything was decided the night before, when I made the appointment with the fixer it was the night before I 1\/8went 3\/8. It was not a week before so that I started talk to everybody about it, it was the night before and I was in my hotel in Tilis,” he said.<\/p>\n

Taub, meanwhile, said he stands by his story but purposely didn’t name the photographer so as not to suggest he directly caused the kidnapping.<\/p>\n

“While he made Kilis a more dangerous town than it already was, a lot of factors could have triggered the abduction. It was a dangerous town. People were being watched. Many people had recently disappeared on the road to Aleppo. He is relevant, but he can’t be blamed for what happened,” Taub said.<\/p>\n

He said he didn’t give Choquette a chance to respond to the allegations because he thought the photographer would likely “release information he shouldn’t which could endanger more people on the ground.”<\/p>\n

Choquette said he doesn’t believe Taub’s explanation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

TORONTO — A Montreal photographer is speaking out after a U.S. news website accused him of inadvertently playing a role …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":23392,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1482,18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23391","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-breaking","category-news-ca","mauthors-adam-miller","mauthors-the-canadian-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23391","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23391"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23391\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23392"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23391"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23391"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23391"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}