HE spent the night only a few miles from the battle lines of one of the world’s most hated terror groups.

Facing the threat of ambush by snipers Anglican priest Andrew Ashdown went on a peace mission speaking to people caught up in the civil war in Syria.

Days before parliament voted to start air strikes on Islamic State (IS) positions in Syria, Rev Ashdown was one of 14 delegates from across the world on the six-day trip to the war-torn country.

The group ventured from the capital Damascus to cities Homs and Tartous via other towns and villages and hearing arguments from all sides in the conflict.

Rev Ashdown, who lives in North Baddesley, spent three nights in a monastery only eight kilometres from the battle lines with IS where he could hear gunfire and shells exploding.

On another occasion the delegation were sped from a Christian village in remote hills under armed escort after another rebel group threatened to ambush them with snipers.

Speaking to the Romsey Advertiser tThe 51-year old said the group was “right in the heart of things”.

They had hoped to get to the city of Aleppo but were told it was too dangerous to get to.

Rev Ashdown said: “With shells being fired not far away you do wonder what’s going to happen next.

“There’s always concern about safety everywhere, no where’s particularly safe.”

For Revd Ashdown, who is the interfaith advisor for the Winchester diocese, his greatest fear was being kidnapped.

“I said to my wife before I left, I would dread the horror of being kidnapped. It would lead to a brutal death,” he said.

It was the third visit in two years to Syria, on the previous one he saw a shell explode outside his room which killed two young men.

With one of very few British people allowed into the country the father of four was able to see the conflict with his own eyes adding that the West’s perception of the conflict is “skewed”.

While Rev Ashdown agrees that the threat from terror groups such as IS needs to be removed, he also thinks that the West has its own “political agenda”.

He said: “With so few foreigners going into Syria at the moment the feeling Syrians is that their stories are not being listened to.”

“[The civil war] has come close to absolutely everybody, everybody is exposed to it, everybody has lost people, many have lost their homes.”

He said that where there’s been conflict there’s been “almost complete devastation”.

Denouncing the decision to launch air strike in Syria as “misguided” he said: “The message from the people in Syria is ‘stop all forms of violence end, all support to all militant groups and actually include Syria in the political dialogue.”