The father of kidnapped photojournalist John Cantlie has died, not knowing whether a video message he sent to his son's Islamic State captors had reached him.
Paul Cantlie, 80, lost his fight for life following complications after suffering pneumonia. In a statement, the family said: "Paul died not knowing whether John's captors had received any of the messages he had sent to them."
It said they had made "urgent" but futile attempts to contact John Cantlie to inform him of his father's death on Thursday.
Father-of-three Mr Cantlie's physical strength had been diminishing since his son's kidnap two years ago.
In an emotional video message from hospital, Mr Cantlie senior had told his son that he was "very proud" of his actions in wanting to report from Syria.
However, the family added that Paul Cantlie had "totally deplored what he and many others saw as an abuse of power by Tony Blair when the UK went into Iraq in 2003. With many others, he called for Tony Blair to be indicted for war crimes."
The Cantlies said the lack of any communication from his kidnappers following the messages had left Mr Cantlie senior feeling a "terrible sense of abandonment".
"This burden has been especially hard these last few days, as we have so needed to tell John that his father, whom he so loved, has died," he added.
The family added that their father's fortitude, quiet courage, humour and intelligence had been tested in recent times, but his determination was a beacon for the family "as they struggle with the realities they all currently face".
John Cantlie, from Surrey, has appeared from captivity in carefully scripted videos in which he criticises both the US and UK. His capture follows the killings of David Haines, 44, who was educated in Perth, and Alan Henning, 47, from Greater Manchester, both aid workers who were captured in Syria.
Their families joined together at the weekend to call for communities to rise above the terrorists.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article