THE mother of a Worcester woman thrown out of Iraq has spoken of her relief at finding out she is safe and well.

A late-night phone call brought an end to an anxious two-day wait for news of Jo Wilding in bomb-torn Baghdad.

The 28-year-old human rights activist called from Jordan at 11pm on Monday, after being told to leave the Iraqi capital.

"It was total relief to know that she was out," said her mother, Anne, of Talavera Road, Norton, near Worcester.

"She didn't have enough money to talk for long, and I don't know who she is with or how she got out. But they had just arrived in Jordan and were going to catch the first available flight back to England."

She added that she felt great relief at her daughter's homecoming, who is due to catch a flight back to England from neighbouring Oman.

"There was several people expelled at the same time, so it may be she has not managed to get a flight yet."

Mrs Wilding had last heard from Jo by e-mail on Saturday and had not been able to call her because the telephone lines were down.

"I just realise now how worried I had been for her and what a relief it is to know she is safe."

She feared what her daughter might do, because she had sounded so angry in the last message she posted on her web site.

"I wondered what would happen when the Americans got there. I had visions of her hitting out at them and getting shot," said her mother.

Jo had recorded a horrifying catalogue of injuries to civilians resulting from the bombing in and around Baghdad.

She had ended with an impassioned outcry against the politicians who engineered the invasion.

"These politicians have to go. The whole system has to go.

"They've failed us, whatever their ideology - now it's time for the people," she wrote.

Mrs Wilding said she had been "bothered" when she could not get in touch with Jo, but knew the phone lines were down and trusted that her daughter would get in touch as soon as she could.

"She does have strong views and she is definitely for the underdog. I'm really proud of her.

"She does what she wants and I am not always in agreement with what she feels, but I think it was a bit rushed to go to war.

""We could have gone on with peaceful methods much longer," she said.

"With Jo writing about them, the Iraqis became people rather than just a country - people we were going to go and bomb. That put a different complexion on it."

These same people had been kind to Jo and had often shared their food with her, she said.

Jo's diary of events in Baghdad can be found on the web site www.bristolfoe.org.uk/wildfire/