Taliban release sole American hostage in Afghanistan in prisoner swap

GOOBJOOG NEWS|ISLAMABAD: The Taliban on Monday released Bashir Noorzai, a Taliban drug lord who was incarcerated in the United States serving a life sentence, in exchange for Mark Frerichs, the sole American prisoner still held captive in Afghanistan.

The nearly 60-year-old American engineer and Navy veteran Frerichs was kidnapped in Kabul in early 2020 while U.S. and NATO troops were combating the then-Taliban insurgency on behalf of the Western-backed Afghan government, according to Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi.

After spending 31 months in captivity in Afghanistan, Frerichs was on his way home, according to a statement from President Joe Biden. Biden claimed to have called with Frerichs’ family and given them the “wonderful news.”

Noorzai, also known as Haji Bashir, was detained in New York in 2005 and later charged with smuggling heroin worth millions of dollars into the country. According to reports, the top Taliban associate used heroin trafficking profits to support and arm the insurgents.

According to Muttaqi, the prisoner swap was the result of protracted negotiations between the Taliban and the U.S. and was “unique in the history of Afghanistan.” He claimed that up until this point, prisoner swaps between the two ex-enemies had happened outside of Afghanistan.