Turkey car blast death toll rises to 43
The death toll of twin car bombs in a Turkish
town near the Syrian border rose to 43 and wounded many more on Saturday and
the government said it suspected Syrian involvement.
The bombing increased fears that Syria's civil war was dragging in neighbouring states despite renewed diplomatic moves towards ending two years of fighting in which more than 70 000 people have been killed.
The bombs ripped into crowded streets near Reyhanli's shopping district in the early afternoon, scattering concrete blocks and smashing cars in the town in Turkey's southern Hatay province, home to thousands of Syrian refugees.
Restaurants and cafes were destroyed and body parts were strewn across the streets. The damage went at least three blocks deep from the site of the blasts.
President Bashar Assad's administration was the "usual suspect" in the attacks, Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc said.
"We know that the people taking refuge in Hatay have become targets for the Syrian regime," Arinc said in comments broadcast on Turkish television. "We think of them as the usual suspects when it comes to planning such a horrific attack."
Condemned
Another deputy prime minister, Besir Atalay, was quoted by NTV as saying initial findings suggested the attackers came from inside Turkey, but had links to Syria's intelligence agency.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility. Nor was there any comment from Damascus.
The United States strongly condemned the attacks and vowed support in identifying those responsible, while Nato Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen and French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius voiced "full solidarity" with Turkey.
Nato member Turkey supports the uprising against Assad and violence has crossed the border before, but not on the same scale. The bombings were the bloodiest incident on Turkish soil since Syria's conflict began more than two years ago.
War fears
Turkey is far from alone in fearing the impact of Syria's war, which is already helping inflame the Middle East's tangle of sectarian, religious and nationalist struggles.
Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said it was no coincidence the bombings came as diplomatic moves to end the Syrian conflict intensify.
"There may be those who want to sabotage Turkey's peace, but we will not allow that," Davutoglu told reporters during a trip to Berlin. "No one should attempt to test Turkey's power."
Prospects appeared to improve this week for diplomacy to try to end the civil war, now in its third year, after Moscow and Washington announced a joint effort to bring government and rebels to an international conference.
But a Russian official said on Saturday that there was already disagreement over who would take part and he doubted whether a meeting could happen this month.
As well as disputes over who would represent the rebels and government at any talks, there have also been questions over possible participation by Assad's Shi'ite ally Iran. The rebels are backed by the largely Sunni Gulf states.
Diplomats in New York said the Syria meeting would likely slip into June and it was unclear who would participate.
Death toll may rise
In Reyhanli, smoke poured from charred ruins after the blasts outside administrative buildings.
"My children were so scared because it reminded them of the bombings when we were in Aleppo. God help us," said one refugee from the northern Syrian city, a mother of three who gave her name as Kolsum.
Atalay said 43 people had been killed, while Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan warned the toll could rise. Officials said more than 100 people were injured, many of them critically.
Erdogan said the bombings might have been related to Turkey's own peace process with Kurdish militants of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), who began a withdrawal this week to end a three decade conflict.
Syrian refugees
But the PKK's main area of operation was hundreds of kilometres further east and Erdogan said the blasts could also have been aimed at provoking sensitivities in a region that is home to so many Syrian refugees.
Turkey is sheltering more than 300 000 Syrians, most of them in camps along the 900km frontier, and is struggling to keep up with the influx.
Protests erupted in Reyhanli after the blasts, with some locals blaming Syrian there for bringing violence over the frontier and smashing their car windows, while others railed against Turkey's foreign policy, chanting for Erdogan to resign.
The main opposition Syrian National Coalition said the attacks were a failed attempt to "destroy the brotherhood" between Syrians and Turks and were intended as a punishment for Turkey's support of the uprising.
Erdogan said this week Turkey would support a US-enforced no-fly zone in Syria and warned that Damascus crossed President Barack Obama's "red line" on chemical weapons use long ago.
A no-fly zone to prohibit Syrian military aircraft from hitting rebel targets has been mentioned by American lawmakers as one option the United States could use to pressure Assad.
Erdogan is due to meet Obama in Washington on May 16.
Violence also crossed the border in February, when a minibus blew up at a border crossing near Reyhanli, killing 14 people.
The Syrian opposition said one of its delegations appeared to have been the target of that attack, but there has been no confirmation of this from the Turkish authorities.
In October, five Turkish civilians were killed in Akcakale when a mortar bomb fired from Syria landed on their house, prompting Turkey to fire back across the frontier.
The bombing increased fears that Syria's civil war was dragging in neighbouring states despite renewed diplomatic moves towards ending two years of fighting in which more than 70 000 people have been killed.
The bombs ripped into crowded streets near Reyhanli's shopping district in the early afternoon, scattering concrete blocks and smashing cars in the town in Turkey's southern Hatay province, home to thousands of Syrian refugees.
Restaurants and cafes were destroyed and body parts were strewn across the streets. The damage went at least three blocks deep from the site of the blasts.
President Bashar Assad's administration was the "usual suspect" in the attacks, Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc said.
"We know that the people taking refuge in Hatay have become targets for the Syrian regime," Arinc said in comments broadcast on Turkish television. "We think of them as the usual suspects when it comes to planning such a horrific attack."
Condemned
Another deputy prime minister, Besir Atalay, was quoted by NTV as saying initial findings suggested the attackers came from inside Turkey, but had links to Syria's intelligence agency.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility. Nor was there any comment from Damascus.
The United States strongly condemned the attacks and vowed support in identifying those responsible, while Nato Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen and French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius voiced "full solidarity" with Turkey.
Nato member Turkey supports the uprising against Assad and violence has crossed the border before, but not on the same scale. The bombings were the bloodiest incident on Turkish soil since Syria's conflict began more than two years ago.
War fears
Turkey is far from alone in fearing the impact of Syria's war, which is already helping inflame the Middle East's tangle of sectarian, religious and nationalist struggles.
Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said it was no coincidence the bombings came as diplomatic moves to end the Syrian conflict intensify.
"There may be those who want to sabotage Turkey's peace, but we will not allow that," Davutoglu told reporters during a trip to Berlin. "No one should attempt to test Turkey's power."
Prospects appeared to improve this week for diplomacy to try to end the civil war, now in its third year, after Moscow and Washington announced a joint effort to bring government and rebels to an international conference.
But a Russian official said on Saturday that there was already disagreement over who would take part and he doubted whether a meeting could happen this month.
As well as disputes over who would represent the rebels and government at any talks, there have also been questions over possible participation by Assad's Shi'ite ally Iran. The rebels are backed by the largely Sunni Gulf states.
Diplomats in New York said the Syria meeting would likely slip into June and it was unclear who would participate.
Death toll may rise
In Reyhanli, smoke poured from charred ruins after the blasts outside administrative buildings.
"My children were so scared because it reminded them of the bombings when we were in Aleppo. God help us," said one refugee from the northern Syrian city, a mother of three who gave her name as Kolsum.
Atalay said 43 people had been killed, while Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan warned the toll could rise. Officials said more than 100 people were injured, many of them critically.
Erdogan said the bombings might have been related to Turkey's own peace process with Kurdish militants of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), who began a withdrawal this week to end a three decade conflict.
Syrian refugees
But the PKK's main area of operation was hundreds of kilometres further east and Erdogan said the blasts could also have been aimed at provoking sensitivities in a region that is home to so many Syrian refugees.
Turkey is sheltering more than 300 000 Syrians, most of them in camps along the 900km frontier, and is struggling to keep up with the influx.
Protests erupted in Reyhanli after the blasts, with some locals blaming Syrian there for bringing violence over the frontier and smashing their car windows, while others railed against Turkey's foreign policy, chanting for Erdogan to resign.
The main opposition Syrian National Coalition said the attacks were a failed attempt to "destroy the brotherhood" between Syrians and Turks and were intended as a punishment for Turkey's support of the uprising.
Erdogan said this week Turkey would support a US-enforced no-fly zone in Syria and warned that Damascus crossed President Barack Obama's "red line" on chemical weapons use long ago.
A no-fly zone to prohibit Syrian military aircraft from hitting rebel targets has been mentioned by American lawmakers as one option the United States could use to pressure Assad.
Erdogan is due to meet Obama in Washington on May 16.
Violence also crossed the border in February, when a minibus blew up at a border crossing near Reyhanli, killing 14 people.
The Syrian opposition said one of its delegations appeared to have been the target of that attack, but there has been no confirmation of this from the Turkish authorities.
In October, five Turkish civilians were killed in Akcakale when a mortar bomb fired from Syria landed on their house, prompting Turkey to fire back across the frontier.
Sharif claims victory in Pakistan vote
Former prime minister Nawaz Sharif late on
Saturday declared victory for his centre-right opposition Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N) party and invited other parties to work with
him.
"We should thank Allah that he has given PML-N another chance to serve you and Pakistan," he said in a speech to jubilant supporters, who shouted "prime minister Nawaz Sharif" in his powerbase Lahore.
"Whatever promises we made with our youth, I assure you that we fulfil each of them. Results are still coming but there is a confirmation that PML-N will emerge as the largest party," Sharif said.
According to the unofficial, partial results it appeared that no single party would win a simple majority of 172 seats in the national assembly, raising the prospect of protracted talks to form a coalition government.
"I appeal for all parties to come to the table and sit with me and solve the country's problems," Sharif said.
"I'm doing this only because of you. If it had been only myself, I would not talk to them but it's for you and for the survival of your future generations," he added.
"We should thank Allah that he has given PML-N another chance to serve you and Pakistan," he said in a speech to jubilant supporters, who shouted "prime minister Nawaz Sharif" in his powerbase Lahore.
"Whatever promises we made with our youth, I assure you that we fulfil each of them. Results are still coming but there is a confirmation that PML-N will emerge as the largest party," Sharif said.
According to the unofficial, partial results it appeared that no single party would win a simple majority of 172 seats in the national assembly, raising the prospect of protracted talks to form a coalition government.
"I appeal for all parties to come to the table and sit with me and solve the country's problems," Sharif said.
"I'm doing this only because of you. If it had been only myself, I would not talk to them but it's for you and for the survival of your future generations," he added.
Iran ex-leader Rafsanjani to stand again
Iran's moderate conservative former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani on
Saturday registered his candidacy to stand for the office again in the election
on 14 June, an AFP correspondent witnessed.
Rafsanjani, who will be 79 in August, filed his papers at the interior ministry during the final minutes of the five-day registration process which wrapped up on Saturday.
"I came to serve. It is the right of the people to choose me or not," Iranian media quoted him as saying.
Rafsanjani has been isolated since the 2009 presidential election, which saw massive street protests against the disputed re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
He then called for the release of people rounded up during the demonstrations.
Rafsanjani, president between 1989 and 1997, currently chairs the Expediency Council, the highest political arbitration body, whose members are appointed by the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Heavyweight
Also on Saturday, Saeed Jalili, Iran's top nuclear negotiator and close figure to all-powerful supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, unexpectedly showed up at the ministry and registered his candidacy.
A veteran of the 1980s war with Iraq in which he lost his lower right leg, Jalili, 47, did not speak to reporters, an AFP correspondent said.
Jalili heads the team in negotiations with world powers over Tehran's controversial atomic activities which the West fears are aimed at developing a military capacity, a claim denied by Iran.
According to the interior ministry, more than 450 people have registered, including 14 women. Approved candidates will have three weeks to campaign before polling day on 14 June.
Rafsanjani, who will be 79 in August, filed his papers at the interior ministry during the final minutes of the five-day registration process which wrapped up on Saturday.
"I came to serve. It is the right of the people to choose me or not," Iranian media quoted him as saying.
Rafsanjani has been isolated since the 2009 presidential election, which saw massive street protests against the disputed re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
He then called for the release of people rounded up during the demonstrations.
Rafsanjani, president between 1989 and 1997, currently chairs the Expediency Council, the highest political arbitration body, whose members are appointed by the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Heavyweight
Also on Saturday, Saeed Jalili, Iran's top nuclear negotiator and close figure to all-powerful supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, unexpectedly showed up at the ministry and registered his candidacy.
A veteran of the 1980s war with Iraq in which he lost his lower right leg, Jalili, 47, did not speak to reporters, an AFP correspondent said.
Jalili heads the team in negotiations with world powers over Tehran's controversial atomic activities which the West fears are aimed at developing a military capacity, a claim denied by Iran.
According to the interior ministry, more than 450 people have registered, including 14 women. Approved candidates will have three weeks to campaign before polling day on 14 June.
Milan: Man kills 1 in pickaxe rampage
An immigrant from Ghana went on a rampage
with a pickaxe in Milan at dawn on Saturday, killing a passerby and wounding four others in an
apparently random attack, police said.
Carabinieri paramilitary police in Milan said the 21-year-old attacker was taken into custody shortly after the attacks in a residential area on the northern outskirts of the city.
People working in cafes and other businesses near the attack told Sky TG24 TV that the man wildly swung a pickaxe, running down streets and ferociously striking passersby, mainly on the head. Pools of blood stained the streets.
A 40-year-old man died after being struck on the head with the pickaxe and suffering further blows to the abdomen while he lay on the ground, police said. The victim was described as an unemployed man who was heading to a cafe near his home.
Among those wounded was a man in his 20s who was helping his father deliver newspapers to newsstands; another was a man walking his dog.
Motive
At first it appeared five people had been wounded, but police later said the sixth person the attacker swung at darted into a doorway in the nick of time and escaped injury.
Two of the wounded were in critical condition.
Police said the motive was unclear.
"Police blocked him with difficulty. He was in an evident state of marked psychological stress," Colonel Biagio Storniolo told reporters. Asked about the motive, Storniolo said the suspect "was not being co-operative. He says only that he is hungry and has no home".
The man, identified as Mada Kabobo, 21, was jailed while he is investigated for murder and two counts of attempted murder for the two persons who were most critically wounded, police said.
Previous arrest
First media reports said the man had ignored a 2011 expulsion order because he was not legally in the country, but police later clarified that the expulsion papers had not yet been issued because legal proceedings in southern Italy were pending.
Police said they identified the suspect, who had no documents on him, from fingerprints.
Police said he was in the country illegally, and had previously been arrested in the Puglia region for alleged, theft, robbery, property damage and resisting public authorities.
Milan Mayor Giuliano Pisapia said the entire city was shocked that a man would go on such a rampage, "killing one and wounding several, even gravely, just because he ran into them on his path".
Carabinieri paramilitary police in Milan said the 21-year-old attacker was taken into custody shortly after the attacks in a residential area on the northern outskirts of the city.
People working in cafes and other businesses near the attack told Sky TG24 TV that the man wildly swung a pickaxe, running down streets and ferociously striking passersby, mainly on the head. Pools of blood stained the streets.
A 40-year-old man died after being struck on the head with the pickaxe and suffering further blows to the abdomen while he lay on the ground, police said. The victim was described as an unemployed man who was heading to a cafe near his home.
Among those wounded was a man in his 20s who was helping his father deliver newspapers to newsstands; another was a man walking his dog.
Motive
At first it appeared five people had been wounded, but police later said the sixth person the attacker swung at darted into a doorway in the nick of time and escaped injury.
Two of the wounded were in critical condition.
Police said the motive was unclear.
"Police blocked him with difficulty. He was in an evident state of marked psychological stress," Colonel Biagio Storniolo told reporters. Asked about the motive, Storniolo said the suspect "was not being co-operative. He says only that he is hungry and has no home".
The man, identified as Mada Kabobo, 21, was jailed while he is investigated for murder and two counts of attempted murder for the two persons who were most critically wounded, police said.
Previous arrest
First media reports said the man had ignored a 2011 expulsion order because he was not legally in the country, but police later clarified that the expulsion papers had not yet been issued because legal proceedings in southern Italy were pending.
Police said they identified the suspect, who had no documents on him, from fingerprints.
Police said he was in the country illegally, and had previously been arrested in the Puglia region for alleged, theft, robbery, property damage and resisting public authorities.
Milan Mayor Giuliano Pisapia said the entire city was shocked that a man would go on such a rampage, "killing one and wounding several, even gravely, just because he ran into them on his path".
Cleveland women face long road to healing
Year after year, the clock ticked by and the
calendar marched forward, carrying the three women further from the real world
and pulling them deeper into an isolated nightmare.
Now, for the women freed from captivity inside a Cleveland house, the ordeal is not over. Next comes recovery - from sexual abuse and their sudden, jarring re-entry into a world much different from the one they were snatched from a decade ago.
Therapists say that with extensive treatment and support, healing is likely for the women, who were 14, 16 and 21 when they were abducted. But it is often a long and difficult process.
"It's sort of like coming out of a coma," says Dr Barbara Greenberg, a psychologist who specialises in treating abused teenagers. "It's a very isolating and bewildering experience."
In the world the women left behind, a gallon of gas cost about $1.80. Barack Obama was a state senator. Phones were barely taking pictures. Things did not "go viral". There was no YouTube, no Facebook, no iPhone.
Adolescence taken
Emerging into the future is difficult enough. The two younger Cleveland women are doing it without the benefit of crucial formative years.
"By taking away their adolescence, they weren't able to develop emotional and psychological and social skills," says Duane Bowers, who counsels traumatised families through the National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children.
"They're 10 years behind in these skills. Those need to be caught up before they can work on reintegrating into society," he says.
That society can be terrifying. As freed captive Georgina DeJesus arrived home from the hospital, watched by a media horde, she hid herself beneath a hooded sweatshirt. The freed Amanda Berry slipped into her home without being seen.
"They weren't hiding from the press, from the cameras," Bowers says. "They were hiding from the freedom, from the expansiveness."
Control
In the house owned by Ariel Castro, who is charged with kidnapping and raping the women, claustrophobic control ruled.
Police say Castro kept them chained in a basement and locked in upstairs rooms, that he fathered a child with one of them, and that he starved and beat his captives into multiple miscarriages.
In all those years, they only set foot outside of the house twice - and then only as far as the garage.
"Something as simple as walking into a Target is going to be a major problem for them," Bowers says.
Jessica Donohue-Dioh, who works with survivors of human trafficking as a social work instructor at Xavier University in Cincinnati, says the freedom to make decisions can be one of the hardest parts of recovery.
"'How should I respond? What do they really want from me?'" Donohue-Dioh says, describing a typical reaction. "They may feel they may not have a choice in giving the right answer."
Kidnap survivors
That has been a challenge for Jaycee Dugard, who is now an advocate for trauma victims after surviving 18 years in captivity - "learning how to speak up, how to say what I want instead of finding out what everybody else wants," Dugard told ABC News.
Like Berry, Dugard was impregnated by her captor and is now raising the two children. She still feels anger about her ordeal.
"But then on the other hand, I have two beautiful daughters that I can never be sorry about," Dugard says.
Another step toward normalcy for the three women will be accepting something that seems obvious to the rest of the world: They have no reason to feel guilty.
"First of all, I'd make sure these young women know that nothing that happened to them is their fault," Elizabeth Smart, who was kidnapped at age 14 and held in sexual captivity for nine months, told People magazine.
Guilt
Donohue-Dioh says that even for people victimised by monstrous criminals, guilt is a common reaction. The Cleveland women told police they were snatched after accepting rides from Castro.
"They need to recognise that what happened as a result of that choice is not the rightful or due punishment. That's really difficult sometimes," Donohue-Dioh says.
Family support will be crucial, the therapists say. But what does family mean when one member has spent a decade trapped with strangers?
"The family has to be ready to include a stranger into its sphere," Bowers says. "Because if they try to reintegrate the 14-year-old girl who went missing, that's not going to work. That 14-year-old girl doesn't exist anymore. They have to accept this stranger as someone they don't know."
Natascha Kampusch, who was kidnapped in Austria at age 10 and spent eight years in captivity, has said that her 2006 reunion with her family was both euphoric and awkward.
"I had lived for too long in a nightmare, the psychological prison was still there and stood between me and my family," Kampusch wrote in 3096 Days, her account of the ordeal.
Kampusch, now 25, said in a German television interview that she was struggling to form normal relationships, partly because many people seem to shy away from her.
"What a lot of these people say is, what's more important than what happened is how people react," says Greenberg, the psychologist.
Sympathy, support
The world has reacted to the Cleveland women with an outpouring of sympathy and support. This reaction will live on, amplified by the technologies that rose while the women were locked away.
Yet these women are more than the sum of their Wikipedia pages. Dugard, Smart and other survivors often speak of not being defined by their tragedies - another challenge for the Cleveland survivors.
"A classmate will hear their name, or a co-worker, and will put them in this box: This is who you are and what happened to you," Donohue-Dioh says. "Our job as society is to move beyond what they are and what they've experienced."
"This isn't who they are," Dugard told People. "It is only what happened to them."
Still, for the three Cleveland women, their journey forward will always include that horrifying lost decade.
"We can't escape our past," Donohue-Dioh says, "so how are we able to manage how much it influences our present and our future?"
Now, for the women freed from captivity inside a Cleveland house, the ordeal is not over. Next comes recovery - from sexual abuse and their sudden, jarring re-entry into a world much different from the one they were snatched from a decade ago.
Therapists say that with extensive treatment and support, healing is likely for the women, who were 14, 16 and 21 when they were abducted. But it is often a long and difficult process.
"It's sort of like coming out of a coma," says Dr Barbara Greenberg, a psychologist who specialises in treating abused teenagers. "It's a very isolating and bewildering experience."
In the world the women left behind, a gallon of gas cost about $1.80. Barack Obama was a state senator. Phones were barely taking pictures. Things did not "go viral". There was no YouTube, no Facebook, no iPhone.
Adolescence taken
Emerging into the future is difficult enough. The two younger Cleveland women are doing it without the benefit of crucial formative years.
"By taking away their adolescence, they weren't able to develop emotional and psychological and social skills," says Duane Bowers, who counsels traumatised families through the National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children.
"They're 10 years behind in these skills. Those need to be caught up before they can work on reintegrating into society," he says.
That society can be terrifying. As freed captive Georgina DeJesus arrived home from the hospital, watched by a media horde, she hid herself beneath a hooded sweatshirt. The freed Amanda Berry slipped into her home without being seen.
"They weren't hiding from the press, from the cameras," Bowers says. "They were hiding from the freedom, from the expansiveness."
Control
In the house owned by Ariel Castro, who is charged with kidnapping and raping the women, claustrophobic control ruled.
Police say Castro kept them chained in a basement and locked in upstairs rooms, that he fathered a child with one of them, and that he starved and beat his captives into multiple miscarriages.
In all those years, they only set foot outside of the house twice - and then only as far as the garage.
"Something as simple as walking into a Target is going to be a major problem for them," Bowers says.
Jessica Donohue-Dioh, who works with survivors of human trafficking as a social work instructor at Xavier University in Cincinnati, says the freedom to make decisions can be one of the hardest parts of recovery.
"'How should I respond? What do they really want from me?'" Donohue-Dioh says, describing a typical reaction. "They may feel they may not have a choice in giving the right answer."
Kidnap survivors
That has been a challenge for Jaycee Dugard, who is now an advocate for trauma victims after surviving 18 years in captivity - "learning how to speak up, how to say what I want instead of finding out what everybody else wants," Dugard told ABC News.
Like Berry, Dugard was impregnated by her captor and is now raising the two children. She still feels anger about her ordeal.
"But then on the other hand, I have two beautiful daughters that I can never be sorry about," Dugard says.
Another step toward normalcy for the three women will be accepting something that seems obvious to the rest of the world: They have no reason to feel guilty.
"First of all, I'd make sure these young women know that nothing that happened to them is their fault," Elizabeth Smart, who was kidnapped at age 14 and held in sexual captivity for nine months, told People magazine.
Guilt
Donohue-Dioh says that even for people victimised by monstrous criminals, guilt is a common reaction. The Cleveland women told police they were snatched after accepting rides from Castro.
"They need to recognise that what happened as a result of that choice is not the rightful or due punishment. That's really difficult sometimes," Donohue-Dioh says.
Family support will be crucial, the therapists say. But what does family mean when one member has spent a decade trapped with strangers?
"The family has to be ready to include a stranger into its sphere," Bowers says. "Because if they try to reintegrate the 14-year-old girl who went missing, that's not going to work. That 14-year-old girl doesn't exist anymore. They have to accept this stranger as someone they don't know."
Natascha Kampusch, who was kidnapped in Austria at age 10 and spent eight years in captivity, has said that her 2006 reunion with her family was both euphoric and awkward.
"I had lived for too long in a nightmare, the psychological prison was still there and stood between me and my family," Kampusch wrote in 3096 Days, her account of the ordeal.
Kampusch, now 25, said in a German television interview that she was struggling to form normal relationships, partly because many people seem to shy away from her.
"What a lot of these people say is, what's more important than what happened is how people react," says Greenberg, the psychologist.
Sympathy, support
The world has reacted to the Cleveland women with an outpouring of sympathy and support. This reaction will live on, amplified by the technologies that rose while the women were locked away.
Yet these women are more than the sum of their Wikipedia pages. Dugard, Smart and other survivors often speak of not being defined by their tragedies - another challenge for the Cleveland survivors.
"A classmate will hear their name, or a co-worker, and will put them in this box: This is who you are and what happened to you," Donohue-Dioh says. "Our job as society is to move beyond what they are and what they've experienced."
"This isn't who they are," Dugard told People. "It is only what happened to them."
Still, for the three Cleveland women, their journey forward will always include that horrifying lost decade.
"We can't escape our past," Donohue-Dioh says, "so how are we able to manage how much it influences our present and our future?"
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