[They were freed in the southern province of Zabul, where an Afghan official said the handover was accompanied by a 48-hour cease-fire starting the night before. He spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.]
By Sayed Salahuddin and Sharif Hassan
 |
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Afghan
women hold banners protesting the release of Anas Haqqani in Kabul
on
Friday. (Jawad Jalali/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock)
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KABUL
— An American and an
Australian held hostage by the Taliban for the past three years were freed
Tuesday, just hours after high-level militants were also released, U.S. and
Afghan officials said, in a move officials hope will jump-start peace talks to
end nearly two decades of war in Afghanistan.
American Kevin King, 63, and Australian
Timothy Weeks, 50, were instructors at the American University of Afghanistan
in Kabul when they were kidnapped in 2016. The three militants released are
senior commanders of the Haqqani network, an Afghan insurgent group closely
allied with the Taliban: Mali Khan, Hafiz Rashid and Anas Haqqani.
After their release Tuesday, King and Weeks
were in the care of the U.S. military and would soon be reunited with
relatives, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement.
“The Taliban have indicated that the release
of the two professors is intended as a goodwill gesture, which the United
States welcomes,” Pompeo said. The statement also noted “the Taliban’s
impending release of 10 Afghan prisoners,” who John R. Bass, the U.S.
ambassador to Afghanistan, referred to in a tweet as members of the Afghan
security forces.
A White House statement applauded King and
Weeks’s release and said the men had “endured significant hardship during their
captivity.”
They were freed in the southern province of
Zabul, where an Afghan official said the handover was accompanied by a 48-hour
cease-fire starting the night before. He spoke on the condition of anonymity
because of the sensitivity of the matter.
Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said the
exchange was “good progress for building . . . goodwill and can aid the peace process.”
The three Haqqani militants, who were flown
to Qatar after their release, had been held in a government detention center
near Bagram air base. Khan was captured in 2011, and Rashid and Haqqani were
arrested at the same time in 2014. Haqqani is a younger brother of the
Taliban’s deputy leader and son of the Haqqani network’s founder.
The Haqqani network is accused of
orchestrating sophisticated and deadly attacks against Afghan and foreign
installations in recent years. It has been active in kidnapping foreigners and
is believed to have seized King and Weeks. The U.S. government designated the
network a terrorist organization in 2012.
The prisoner exchange was long sought by U.S.
special envoy Zalmay Khalilzad, who shuttled between Pakistan and Afghanistan
for weeks seeking a goodwill gesture to help restart peace talks with the
Taliban.
Khalilzad had met with Taliban negotiators
for nearly a year before a peace deal appeared imminent just months ago. But in
early September, the effort was scuttled by a tweet from President Trump, who
later declared the talks “dead.” Since then, informal discussions have
attempted to keep the peace effort alive.
Ghani initially announced the prisoner swap
on live television last week, saying it would help bring “peace and stability”
to Afghanistan.
But days later, none of the prisoners had
been freed. Afghan officials blamed the Taliban for the delay, and Taliban
officials blamed the United States.
King and Weeks, the two professors held by
the Taliban, were teaching English at the American University of Afghanistan, a
private nonprofit institution in Kabul, when they were kidnapped. Over the
course of their captivity, concerns mounted that their health was
deteriorating. In October 2017, the Taliban issued a statement saying that King
had heart and kidney disease and needed urgent medical attention.
On Monday night, Ghani discussed the swap
with Pompeo and national security adviser Robert C. O’Brien. The conversation
reviewed “the steps necessary to implement President Ghani’s recent decision to
release the three high-level Taliban/Haqqani detainees,” the presidential
palace in Kabul said in a statement.
“The U.S. officials reiterated their support
for President Ghani’s decision and committed to work closely together to
respond to any possible Taliban violence in the event the group doesn’t respond
in good faith,” the statement added.
If peace talks restart, it is not clear
whether they would pick up where the negotiators left off or begin from
scratch. A draft peace deal included an agreement on the withdrawal of many
American troops from Afghanistan in exchange for a Taliban pledge not to harbor
terrorist groups. But Afghan government officials have said since then that a
cease-fire or reduction in violence is necessary before a deal can be
concluded.
Nicholas Kay, NATO’s civil chief for
Afghanistan, hailed the release of the Taliban-allied prisoners.
“The decision to release conditionally three
prisoners is a bold confidence-building step on the path to peace. Taliban
should reciprocate & also reduce violence,” he said in a tweet.
In a statement Tuesday, King’s family thanked
U.S. government officials for their efforts.
“We are so happy to hear that my brother has
been freed and is on his way home to us,” King’s sister, Stephanie Miller, said
in the statement. “This has been a long and painful ordeal for our entire
family, and his safe return has been our highest priority.”
The American University of Afghanistan
expressed relief about the release of King and Weeks. “We look forward to
providing all the support we can to Kevin and Tim and their families,” a
statement read. “We wish to extend our gratitude to all involved in the release
of our colleagues.”
Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan also
welcomed the release and indicated that his country, which borders Afghanistan,
helped obtain their freedom. The Haqqani network is based in Pakistan.
“As part of the [international] community
working to bring peace & end the suffering of the Afghan people, Pak has
fully supported & facilitated this release,” Khan tweeted.
Trump has said freeing Americans held captive
abroad is a top priority for his administration. But he also has criticized the
2014 exchange of five U.S.-held Taliban prisoners for Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, who
was a hostage. In more than a dozen tweets, he said it was a “BAD DEAL” and
“stupid,” and called Bergdahl a “traitor.”
Hassan reported from Jalalabad, Afghanistan.
Susannah George in Jalalabad contributed to this report.
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