No Concessions with No Teeth: How Kidnap and Ransom Insurers and Insureds are Undermining U.S. Counterterrorism Policy
![handle is hein.journals/emlj56 and id is 753 raw text is: NO CONCESSIONS WITH NO TEETH: HOW KIDNAP AND
RANSOM INSURERS AND INSUREDS ARE UNDERMINING
U.S. COUNTERTERRORISM POLICY
INTRODUCTION
The U.S. Government will make no concessions to individuals or
groups holding official or private U.S. citizens hostage .... [I]t is
U.S. Government policy to deny hostage takers the benefits of
ransom, prisoner releases, policy changes, or other acts of
concession.
The United States' policy for dealing with terrorist demands is clear:
absolutely no concessions.2 No ransoms shall be paid to hostage takers.3 The
policy is stern, but the government's bark is worse than its bite because only
the government is required to comply, not private entities. Private entities pay
millions of dollars in ransom money every year, and scores of insurance
companies sell kidnap and ransom (K & R) insurance policies to reimburse
those entities for ransom payments.4 An entire criminal industry surrounds the
extortion of multinational corporations through kidnap for ransom-a criminal
industry that insurance companies are financing by paying ransoms to hostage
takers in direct opposition to U.S. government policy. One respected journalist
wrote: 'In an unintentional conspiracy, the terrorist, the victim, and the
insurance companies have found a level at which they are all prepared to work.
The kidnappers get their cash, the victims have insurance, and the insurance
companies get their premiums.'5
Not only are insurers funding terrorist activity and profiting from K & R
premiums, but they are also undermining sound public policy designed to
1 Press Statement, Richard Boucher, U.S. Department of State, International Terrorism: American
Hostages (Feb. 20, 2002), http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2002/8190.htm [hereinafter State Department
Hostage Policy] (emphasis added).
2 id.
3 Id.
4 The Insurance Marketplace, http://www.insurancemarketplace.com/default.aspx (follow Search for
Companies by a Category and State hyperlink; then select Category: Kidnap/Ransom Insurance and State:
Georgia; then select Search) (last visited Oct. 17, 2006).
5 ANN HAGEDORN AUERBACH, RANSOM: THE UNTOLD STORY OF INTERNATIONAL KIDNAPPING 216
(1998) (quoting James Adams).](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/emlj56&div=26&collection=journals&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
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No Concessions with No Teeth: How Kidnap and Ransom Insurers and Insureds are Undermining U.S. Counterterrorism Policy
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