An American contractor held hostage in Afghanistan for greater than two years has been launched in alternate for a convicted Taliban drug lord jailed within the US, the White Home stated.
The launch of Mark Frerichs represents a uncommon success in US-Taliban talks for the reason that militant group took energy in Afghanistan a bit of greater than a yr in the past.
Mr Frerichs, a US Navy veteran who had spent greater than a decade in Afghanistan as a civilian contractor, was kidnapped in January 2020 and is believed to have been held since then by the Taliban-linked Haqqani community.
He was traded for Bashir Noorzai, a Taliban affiliate convicted of heroin trafficking conspiracy who had spent 17 years behind bars earlier than his launch on Monday.
Bringing the negotiations that led to Mark’s freedom to a profitable decision required tough choices, which I didn't take evenlyJoe Biden
The alternate is likely one of the most important prisoner swaps to happen beneath the Biden administration, coming 5 months after a take care of Russia that resulted within the launch of marine veteran Trevor Reed.
Although his case has acquired much less public consideration than different People held overseas, together with basketball star Brittney Griner and company safety govt Paul Whelan — who're each held in Russia and whose kinfolk met President Joe Biden on Friday — US officers stated the deal for Mr Frerichs was the fruits of months of quiet negotiations.
The discussions gained new momentum in June when Mr Biden granted Noorzai aid from his life sentence, setting the stage for what one administration official described as a “very slim window of alternative this month” to hold out the deal.
Mr Biden stated in a press release launched by the White Home: “Bringing the negotiations that led to Mark’s freedom to a profitable decision required tough choices, which I didn't take evenly.”
His final vacation spot was not instantly clear, although a Qatari Overseas Ministry official stated Mr Frerichs would quickly head from Doha to the US.
Mr Frerichs, 60, had been engaged on civil engineering tasks on the time of his abduction in Kabul on January 31 2020. He's believed to have been lured into a gathering to debate a brand new challenge after which transported to Khost, a stronghold of the Taliban-linked Haqqani community close to the border with Pakistan.
He was final seen in a video posted final spring by the New Yorker by which he appeared in conventional Afghan clothes and pleaded for his launch.
He was accompanied on Monday by the administration’s particular presidential envoy for hostage affairs and was in secure well being, a US official stated.
Mr Frerichs’ sister Charlene Cakora stated: “I'm so completely satisfied to listen to that my brother is protected and on his manner dwelling to us.
“Our household has prayed for this every day of the greater than 31 months he has been a hostage. We by no means gave up hope that he would survive and are available dwelling safely to us.”
Noorzai, on the time of his 2005 arrest, hardly appeared a really perfect recipient for presidential clemency. He had been designated on a listing reserved for a number of the world’s most prolific drug traffickers, and was prosecuted in federal court docket in New York on expenses that accused him of proudly owning opium fields in Kandahar province and counting on a community of distributors who bought the heroin.
When he was sentenced to life imprisonment, the then-top federal prosecutor in Manhattan stated Noorzai’s “worldwide narcotics community supported a Taliban regime that made Afghanistan a breeding floor for worldwide terrorism”.
The deal underscored the 2 sides to the Taliban’s method to unlawful medicine. In April, they introduced a ban on harvesting the poppies that produce opium for making heroin – an order that additionally outlawed the manufacture and transportation of narcotics. Nevertheless, through the years-long Taliban insurgency, they reportedly made thousands and thousands of kilos taxing farmers and center males who moved their medicine exterior Afghanistan.
A senior administration official stated the US authorities has now decided that Noorzai’s launch would “not materially change any threat to People or basically alter the contours of the drug commerce there”.
Officers additionally took into consideration that Noorzai had spent 17 years in jail, and stated that it turned clear from negotiations that releasing him was the important thing to getting Mr Frerichs dwelling.
At a press convention on Monday, Noorzai expressed gratitude at seeing his “mujahedeen brothers” in Kabul.
“I pray for extra success of the Taliban,” he added. “I hope this alternate can result in peace between Afghanistan and America, as a result of an American was launched and I'm additionally free now.”
The Taliban-appointed overseas minister, Amir Khan Muttaqi, hailed the alternate as the beginning of a “new period” in US-Taliban relations and the opening of a “new door for talks”.