Immoral cartography. I was curious (like most people) to hear about this French journalist who'd been taken hostage in Iraq. This BBC report is entirely predictable, apart from the, forgive me, amusing bit where he said he was 'sleeping in the brush with frogs'. The key drama that the report brings out is when 'The militants accused him of being an Israeli agent and demanded proof of the nationality he claimed by drawing a map of France'. This is just such a vivid image of national politics dictating individual fates that it can only be seen in the sense of a propaganda technique; even more so in the light of the tragedy of the Italian who was murdered when similarly taken hostage. Unfortunately the BBC doesn't scrutinise this angle, either for political significance or moral outrage. Update: A Model response