So Peter has now been held in Kabul for six months, and we can be pretty sure he marked this ‘anniversary’ in his basement cell, with little food or water or medication, and even less sense that the Foreign Office are doing anything to get him out.
 
Six months of his life, lost. Six months of lost time with his beloved wife and family. And no sense of any movement by the UK government to get him, and four other captured Britons, back home to their families.
 
That is why a press conference held this week at Parliament to highlight the cases of four Britons detained was significant. As reported in The Guardian and The Independent, four British men are held in dire situations, and their cases were explained why their families and friends.
 
We heard about James Fitton, cruelly jailed in Iraq for 15 years, for innocently picking up some pottery shards.

Alaa Abd el-Fattah, a prisoner of conscience for three years in Egypt, now on hunger strike and in a perilous situation.
 
Jagtar Singh Johal, arbitrarily detained, and tortured, in India
 
 And of course Peter, whose case was raised by Richard Parry, a filmmaker and old friend campaigning to get him home. Richard explained that there are four other British nationals also held at the same facility in Kabul, and that all initiatives to date had failed, saying “we have very grave misgivings about the Foreign Office…. as it does seem that the Taliban want to come to an arrangement.”
 
The cases are different but there were disturbing common themes. All reported that they had been told to keep the case out of the public domain, and leave the Foreign Office to resolve. But all had lost confidence that the British diplomats were showing any real pro-activity or resolve. And none had been given any access to any high-level British representative, namingly Foreign Secretary Liz Truss. We need real focus from the UK government to bring home Peter, and all detained Britons.