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“Foley and Cantlie tried twice [to escape],” said Mr Espinosa, who is believed to have been freed after a ransom was paid. “The first was a failure before it started. They were caught trying to get off their handcuffs with a skeleton key they made.

“On the second occasion, the American showed his true humanity. After getting out of the room where the prisoners were, he had to wait for Cantlie who was to escape second. The guard saw that Cantlie [had freed himself] and Foley could have tried to escape on his own, but gave himself up. ’I couldn’t leave John on his own,’ Foley said.”

Espinosa is a journalist with the Spanish newspaper El Mundo, which is serialising his account of his kidnapping.

The hostages were guarded mostly by the so-called “Beatles”, nicknamed as such because of their British accents, and including Mohammed Emwazi, the Londoner now better known as Jihadi John.

Espinosa, who was freed last year, said that as a result of their attempts to escape, Foley and Cantlie were subjected to “weeks and weeks” of torture, including waterboarding. Cantlie told him: “They were literally trying to kill us for weeks until they realised that we had given up trying to escape.”

Cantlie remains in captivity, and has appeared in ISIS propaganda videos.