James Loney

Who is James Loney?

James Loney is a Canadian peace activist who has worked for several years with Christian Peacemaker Teams in Iraq and Palestine. On November 26, 2005, he was kidnapped in Baghdad along with three others: Harmeet Singh Sooden and Norman Kember, both members of the delegation he was leading; and Tom Fox, a full-time member of CPT who had been working in Iraq since September 2004. The widely publicized hostage crisis ended on March 23, 2006 when Loney, Kember and Sooden were rescued in a clandestine military operation led by British Special Forces. Tom Fox was killed on March 9, two weeks before the release of the other hostages.

While Loney was held as a hostage, his family and partner Dan Hunt withheld the fact of his homosexuality out of fear for his safety. The media was aware of this fact but cooperated in keeping it secret.

He made a brief media appearance on March 30: "I'll take things slowly until I can get through a day without shaking legs and a pounding heart," he said.

Loney was born in Calgary, Alberta and was raised in Thunder Bay and Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario. During his late teens he worked as a counsellor at Columbus Boys' Camp near Orillia, Ontario, on Lake Simcoe.