Freelance reporter Phil Sands has told of his ordeal at the hands of kidnappers in Iraq.

Former regional press journalist Phil was taken hostage on Boxing Day by gunmen who threatened to behead him after the car he was in was ambushed near Baghdad.

He was freed by chance on New Year’s Eve when American troops carried out a routine raid on the house where he was being held.

Phil, (28), who previously worked for the Chronicle & Echo in Northampton, the Bristol Evening Post and the Watford Observer, was working in Iraq for The Scotsman, among other papers.

When he was kidnapped, Phil was blindfolded and handcuffed before being bundled into the boot of his captors’ car.

He told The Scotsman: “When they slammed the car boot, that was the worst point of the whole ordeal. I just knew I was dead, that I wouldn’t get out alive.

“I began to think of my parents in Britain, how they would have to watch this on the news and what it would do to them.

“I felt I could cope with whatever happened to me; it was what they would go through that was unbearable.

“I could feel the panic rise up, but I had to force it down. I kept telling myself: ‘This will do no good – concentrate only on what will help’.”

When Phil was taken into the bedroom where he was held by the gunmen, he was told that he would be beheaded if he was “guilty” of being a soldier, or of helping the occupation.

He said: “It’s strange, but being told that they would cut off my head wasn’t the worst part.

“The worst part was being put in the boot. I’d already, strangely, accepted that I was dead. I’d already very quickly sunk to the bottom and there wasn’t any place else to go. The fact that they were talking about cutting off my head was better than them actually doing it now. It’s hard to describe the feeling.”

Phil was watched over by an armed guard wearing a balaclava and two or three times a day he was fed rice, tea and bread.

He said: “Occasionally, I was given chicken. They didn’t starve me. It sounds strange, but they looked after me with a kind of courtesy, apart, of course, from the threat of execution.”

On the second day he was made to record a video which never ended up being broadcast on the Internet or al-Jazeera.

Phil said: “It was a strange moment. Very surreal. A fellow came in with a little handicam and I was told in Arabic what to say. They also gave me a handwritten note with the words in childish English, and I remember thinking that all the spelling was wrong.

“I sat there and said all British troops had to pull out of Iraq and all prisoners had to be released. It was all over in a few minutes. But I knew it wouldn’t do any good. No one was going to listen to me.

“Each day I woke up thinking if this would be the day when they would kill me. I kept thinking about the situation I was in and I tried to handle it as well as I could each day. I didn’t have any grand plan for escape.”

But in the early hours of New Year’s Eve, Phil heard the sound of a helicopter’s rotor blades and, knowing that the guard was asleep because of the snoring he could hear, Phil eased off his blindfold.

Moments later the American soldiers stormed the building, broke down the door to Phil’s bedroom and shone a torch in his face.

He said: “I told them: ‘I’m a British journalist. I was kidnapped about a week ago’.”

Phil was then taken outside and loaded into the back of a Black Hawk helicopter before being flown to the Green Zone, the armoured area in Baghdad where coalition forces are based.

In the helicopter he was still in shock.

He said: “I remember feeling so very cold. I think I was still a bit shell-shocked. I didn’t feel any huge wave of relief or start shouting and hollering with delight; that took time.”

As he climbed out of the helicopter in the Green Zone he was met by a number of British officials, one of whom shook his hand and said: “Good to have you back. We didn’t know you were gone. Happy New Year.”

The following morning, Phil was flown to Kuwait, from where he called his parents.

He said: “It was a strange conversation. The first thing my father said was: ‘Not like you to call’. He had thought I was calling to wish him a happy New Year. When I told him I had been kidnapped and had just been freed, he went quiet and then said: ‘I’ll tell your mother.'”

Phil is now at home with his family in Dorset.