Ex-French hostage arrives home; see A5.WIESBADEN, Germany (UPI) - Freed hostage Edward Tracy enjoyed a good night's sleep and a hearty breakfast Monday before medical examinations, while his son Laurence arrived for a long-awaited reunion, a military spokesman said.
Tracy, 60, who was released Sunday by his Islamic fundamentalist captors in Beirut, had asked for a Big Mac hamburger and a cola upon his arrival in Frankfurt late Sunday."Following a good night's sleep, Mr. Tracy ate a hearty breakfast of ham and eggs, toast, tomato juice and black coffee," a spokesman said. "He will undergo more medical tests today."
The spokesman said that Tracy's son Laurence had arrived to meet with his father in Wiesbaden but could not say where the son had traveled from or whether father and son had met yet.
"We understand that Mr. Tracy does not want to speak to the media and neither does his son," the spokesman said.
After Tracy's arrival Sunday, a spokesman said that Tracy seemed to be in "good physical condition."
His captors had released Tracy in Beirut, where he was escorted by Syrian authorities to Damascus and handed over to U.S. officials.
In an interview with Syrian television earlier, Tracy said in slurred speech that he was "really surprised the world is still here. I thought it had powdered off some-where."
He said that during captivity, he had played cards every day, drank tea every morning and was allowed to watch videos once or twice a week.
"No newspaper, radio or television for quite a while," he said.
Tracy, who lived in Beirut permanently and was known as a book salesman with strong ties to the war-torn country, was abducted at gunpoint Oct. 21, 1986.
The pro-Iranian Revolutionary Justice Organization, which had claimed responsibility for the kidnapping of Tracy and fellow U.S. hostage Joseph Cicippio, 60, said Sunday it would free a hostage by noon, after promising Saturday to free one of the two.
The communique Saturday included a photo of Cicippio.
Tracy was released less than 24 hours after Frenchman Jerome Leyraud was freed after he had been held hostage by a group that had first threatened to kill him if more Western hostages were freed following McCarthy's release.
Islamic fundamentalist groups are still holding 10 Western hostages in Lebanon - five U.S. nationals, two Britons, two Germans and an Italian.
Before McCarthy's release, the last two U.S. hostages freed in Lebanon had been Robert Polhill and Frank Reed, who were let go within eight days of each other in late April 1990.
They both passed through Wiesbaden, where they held emotional reunions with their families, before returning home to the United States.