Monday, August 20, 2007 at 12:28
Subject: /Austria-People/

FEATURE: Austrian kidnap victim struggles to live normal life
By Ivonne Marschall, dpa

Vienna (dpa) - When Natascha Kampusch's face is shown on Austrian TV screens on Monday evening, the 19-year-old kidnap victim will seek to show the world how she is coping with freedom, one year after escaping from a basement dungeon after eight years' captivity.

In a preview of the documentary made to mark the anniversary of her escape on August 23, 2006 from the basement of a house outside Vienna, Kampusch stresses that she was "not a victim," and wants to be taken seriously.

Headlines surrounding the spectacular case have become more rare these days, but media interest in the young Viennese who had been incarcerated in a basement dungeon for eight years by her kidnapper, 44-year-old Wolfgang Priklopil, has not waned.

Yellow press photos allegedly showing Kampusch kissing her boyfriend and a media stampede at the presentation of a book penned by her mother proved that Kampusch was still a far cry from being a "normal" girl.

Family feuds and questions why she has up to now failed to set up a promised charity add to the controversies surrounding the young Austrian.

On August 23, 2006, a sunny summer afternoon, a young woman suddenly turned up in a garden in Strasshof near Vienna, claiming she was Natascha Kampusch, a girl who had vanished on the way to school in March 1998, aged 10.

One of the most spectacular crime cases in Austrian history had suddenly found a surprisingly happy ending.

A few hours later, police confirmed that technician Wolfgang Priklopil, the man who had abducted the girl and kept her like a slave for more than eight years, had committed suicide after Kampusch's escape.

But while the police file on the case was closed, the media hype around Natascha had just begun.

For weeks, she was kept in a secret location, surrounded by doctors, lawyers and media consultants. The unexpectedly well-spoken kidnap victim gave interviews to selected Austrian media, while her lawyers quickly moved against any unauthorized coverage.

Kampusch's priorities today are simple - completing the schooling her kidnapper prevented her from pursuing, learning to drive or going on her first vacation.

She is also trying to cope with a dysfunctional family that predates her disappearance, with her estranged parents Brigitta Sirny and Ludwig Koch now feuding and making mutual unsavoury accusations.

Proceeds from her media deals were destined for a foundation set up to help other kidnap victims, Kampusch said, but the foundation would have to wait. Her own life must have top priority.

"Those eight years made me what I am today. I cannot ignore them," she told Austrian TV.

http://www.eux.tv/article.aspx?articleId=12998