In response to a Washington Examiner inquiry, a State Department spokesperson confirmed on July 11 that three U.S. citizens, George Glezmann, Mahmood Habibi, and Ryan Corbett, are currently being held in Taliban custody. Taliban representatives repeatedly claimed they only held two Americans in detention.
The revelation comes on the heels of a June 30-July 1 meeting between special envoys, United Nations personnel, and Taliban representatives in Doha, Qatar. Afghan women and discussions of the Taliban's human rights violations against them were banned from the discussions.
U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan Thomas West and Special Envoy for Afghan Women, Girls, and Human Rights Rina Amiri attended the Doha talks. West and Amiri held a sideline meeting with Afghanistan’s de-facto government representatives during the talks to discuss releasing captive U.S. citizens, who are uniformly held without charge, without access to U.S. representatives, with extremely limited contact with family, and in abhorrent conditions.
As Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid explained to reporters , “During our meetings, we talked about the two American citizens who are in prison in Afghanistan.” Per Mujahid, Americans “must accept Afghanistan’s conditions. We also have prisoners in America, prisoners in Guantanamo. We should free our prisoners in exchange for them.”
The State Department did not answer questions about whether it would consider exchanging Guantanamo detainees for U.S. citizens. The spokesman stated that West and Amiri “pressed for the immediate and unconditional release” of Glezmann, Habibi, and Corbett and added that the State Department has emphasized, “in public and in private with Taliban representatives — their relationship with the international community depends entirely on their actions.”
The Washington Examiner has previously reported that Corbett was detained in July 2022 on a trip to check in on the Afghan employees of his company, Bloom Afghanistan. Corbett is now being held in a 9-by-9-foot basement cell. Captivity has caused Corbett to “suffer from fainting, seizures, and discolored extremities” while his health declines rapidly. House Resolution 965 and Senate Resolution 638 , issued in June and April, respectively, call for the immediate release of Corbett.
Mahmood Habibi was detained on Aug. 10, 2022 with 29 other employees of ARX Communications because the Taliban believed the company was involved in the targeting of former al Qaeda senior leader Ayman al Zawahiri . House Resolution 1066 , issued March 7, calls for Habibi’s immediate release. Per the resolution, the Taliban “refuse to acknowledge” that they are holding Habibi captive.
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Glezmann’s arrest was not previously well-known. An airline mechanic with Delta , Glezmann was an avid traveler, having visited over 100 countries before being arrested in Afghanistan on Dec. 5, 2022. Similar to Corbett, Glezmann is said to be in deteriorating health as a result of his captivity, and he is in need of immediate care for known medical concerns. Senate Resolution 753 and House Resolution 1347 , issued July 9, call for the immediate release of Glezmann.
This new effort to name and enumerate the U.S. citizens in Taliban detention may be the first sign that the United States has begun to play hardball with the Taliban regime. For U.S. citizens suffering under the Taliban’s mistreatment and for the allies and Afghan women whose lives have been thrust into upheaval since August 2021, it may be a welcome shift.
Beth Bailey ( @BWBailey85 ) is a freelance contributor to Fox News and the co-host of The Afghanistan Project, which takes a deep dive into nearly two decades of war and the tragedy wrought in the wake of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.
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