A senior Taliban detainee held for years at Guantanamo Bay mentioned Monday he used to be launched and passed over previous within the day to the Taliban in Kabul, in alternate for an American prisoner held in Afghanistan.
Bashir Noorzai, a infamous drug lord and member of the Taliban, instructed newshounds in Kabul that he spent 17 years and 6 months within the U.S. detention heart at Guantanamo Bay, and that he used to be the closing Taliban prisoner there.
The Taliban-appointed overseas minister, Amir Khan Muttaqi, additionally spoke on the press convention along Noorzai and welcomed the alternate, pronouncing it marked the beginning of a “new technology” in U.S.-Taliban family members.
Muttaqi mentioned the launched American used to be Mark Frerichs, a Military veteran and civilian contractor abducted in Afghanistan on Jan. 31, 2020.
Frerichs used to be closing noticed in a video disbursed previous this 12 months, pleading for his unencumber in order that he will also be reunited together with his circle of relatives, consistent with a recording posted through The New Yorker mag on the time.
There used to be no unbiased affirmation or phrase from Washington on Frerichs’ unencumber.
“It is a new bankruptcy between Afghanistan and america, it will open a brand new door for talks between each international locations,” Muttaqi mentioned on the Kabul presser.
“This act displays us that every one issues will also be solved via talks and I thank all sides’ groups who labored so arduous for this to occur,” Muttaqi added.
Frerichs, of Lombard, Illinois, used to be believed to be held through the Taliban-affiliated Haqqani community, and U.S. officers throughout two presidential administrations had attempted unsuccessfully to get him house.
Within the video, which marked the primary time Frerichs used to be noticed since his abduction, he says it used to be filmed closing November.
Movies of hostages are infrequently launched to turn evidence that they’re alive and to facilitate negotiations for a unencumber, even though it used to be no longer right away transparent if that used to be the case right here.
The New Yorker mentioned it bought the clip from an unidentified person in Afghanistan.
On the time, the FBI declined to remark at the video’s authenticity, however a sister of Frerichs, Charlene Cakora, issued a observation thanking the Taliban for freeing the video and describing it as “public affirmation of our circle of relatives’s long-held trust that he’s alive after greater than two years in captivity.”
Since their takeover of Afghanistan in August closing 12 months, the Taliban have demanded america unencumber Noorzai in alternate for Frerichs amid expectancies of such exchanges for U.S. electorate held in Afghanistan.
On the other hand, there was no public signal of Washington shifting ahead on any kind of prisoner business or alternate.
The Taliban additionally posted a short lived video Monday on social media appearing Noorzai’s arrival on the Kabul airport the place he used to be welcomed through most sensible Taliban officers, together with Muttaqi. On the press convention, Noorzai expressed thankfulness at seeing his “mujahedeen brothers” — a connection with the Taliban — in Kabul.
“I pray for extra luck of the Taliban,” he added. “I’m hoping this alternate may end up in peace between Afghanistan and The usa, as a result of an American used to be launched and I’m additionally unfastened now.”
Noorzai made no point out of his remedy at Guantanamo Bay, the detention heart used to deal with Muslim militants, together with al-Qaida opponents, the Taliban and suspects captured through U.S. forces in Afghanistan, Iraq, and in different places following the 9/11, 2001 terrorist assaults within the U.S.
The ability become the focal point of globally controversy over alleged violations of the criminal rights of detainees below the Geneva Conventions and accusations of torture or abusive remedy of detainees through U.S. government.
After 9/11, a U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan toppled the Taliban who had harbored al-Qaida leader Osama bin Encumbered and his fans. Bin Encumbered used to be killed in a U.S. raid in Pakistan in 2011.
