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Natascha Kampusch
'I find it natural that you would adapt yourself to identify with your kidnapper.' Photograph: Frank Bauer for the Guardian
It is a freezing late-August afternoon in a not particularly Mozartian part of Vienna. Natascha Kampusch stands before me in her agent's office, shaking my hand. To her left is her agent, Wolfgang Brunner, to her right her translator, Jill Kreuer. Her mouth is very firmly shut, her lips squeezed hard together. I notice a small, discoloured patch of skin on her hand, a wound from a beating that will never completely heal.
"Thank you for meeting me," I say.
She nods, still keeping her mouth tightly closed.
Twelve years ago, when Natascha was 10, she was walking to school (it was the very first occasion her mother had allowed her to walk alone) when she noticed a man standing by a delivery van. He looked neat, conservative. As she passed, he grabbed her and threw her in.
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