Family free after five years held by Taliban
A NORTH American couple who were abducted in Afghanistan by a criminal network with links to the Taliban have been released after five years.
American Caitlan Coleman, 31, and her Canadian husband Joshua Boyle, 34, were freed along with their three young children, all of whom were born in captivity.
The couple travelled to central Asia in the summer of 2012 on a journey that took them to Russia, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, and then Afghanistan.
They lost touch with their families while hiking in a mountainous region near the capital Kabul.
Their last contact was when Joshua got in touch with his in-laws from an internet cafe in an “unsafe” part of Afghanistan on October 8, 2012.
Caitlan was pregnant when the couple were captured by the Haqqani network.
US officials call the group a terrorist organisation and have targeted their leaders with drone strikes. But they also operate like a criminal network and don’t typically kill Western hostages, preferring to ransom them for cash.
In 2013, the couple appeared in two videos asking the US government to help free them. The Taliban posted two more videos of the family last year.
Caitlan’s parents revealed last year that they had received a letter from their daughter in November 2015, in which she wrote that she had given birth to a second child.
The family’s release on Wednesday was secured by Pakistani officials.
The US have long criticised Pakistan for failing to aggressively go after the Haqqanis, who have been behind many attacks against US and allied forces in Afghanistan.
The Pakistan military said US intelligence agencies had been tracking the hostages and discovered they had been brought into Pakistan on Wednesday through tribal areas bordering Afghanistan.
They said: “All hostages were recovered safe and sound and are being repatriated to the country of their origin.”
US president Donald Trump said the release was a “positive moment” for relations between his country and Pakistan.
He added the US hopes “to see this type of cooperation and teamwork in helping secure the release of remaining hostages and in our future joint counterterrorism operations”.