This archive report was first published on 12 November 2019.
Published on November 12, 2019, a deal between the US and the Taliban has secured the freedom of two professors, one American and one Australian, who were held captive for years.
The professors, abducted in August 2016, were the subject of multiple rescue attempts by the US military, but it was not until a deal was struck with the Taliban that their release was secured.
According to officials, the professors were being held in a remote compound in eastern Afghanistan, and their health was deteriorating. The Taliban had released a statement in 2017, citing the professors' health problems, including heart and kidney issues.
One of the professors, in a video released by the Taliban, pleaded with President Trump to save him, saying, “If we stay here for much longer, we will be killed. I don’t want to die here.”
The US has a history of securing the release of hostages through diplomatic leverage and military raids. In recent years, the administration has managed to free about 10 hostages held in captivity overseas.
However, other high-profile hostages remain intractable problems for the administration, including Robert Levinson, a former F.B.I. agent and C.I.A. analyst who was abducted in Iran in 2007, and Austin Tice, an American journalist who disappeared in Syria in 2012.
