In a roughly 30-minute phone call Sunday afternoon, President Biden delivered the difficult news to the families of three Americans being held by the Taliban. He did not have a deal with the Taliban to free their loved ones from captivity, despite what US officials told CBS News was a significant offer the US had made in Doha days earlier. The US considers Ryan Corbett and George Glazeman to be illegally detained by the Taliban, and Mahmoud Habibi, who has dual US-Afghan citizenship, has been “unfairly detained” since 2022.
FBI Public Notice
Ahmad Shah Habibi, Mahmoud Habibi's brother, told CBS News that during the conversation, Mr. Biden clarified that he would not agree to the Taliban's demand that the United States release Muhammad Rahim al-Afghani, a prisoner at Guantanamo Bay, unless the Taliban now release Mahmoud. . An NSC spokesman declined to respond to CBS's inquiry about this specific claim.
Mahmoud Habibi disappeared in Afghanistan in 2022 and the Taliban denied abducting him. In a public notice released by the FBI in August 2024, the agency said it “believes” Habibi was captured by Taliban military or security forces and “has not been heard from since his disappearance.” The FBI report said Habibi was working as a contractor for a Kabul telecommunications company when he disappeared.
The Taliban still say they do not have Habibi in custody.
“No, we don't have him,” Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid told CBS News on Monday.
Asked if Mahmoud had disappeared in Afghanistan, Mujahid said: “It is also unclear because we did not know him before.”
Ahmad Habibi told CBS News, “My family is absolutely certain that my brother is alive. There are things that neither we nor the US government can say publicly, but Mahmoud's case is different from the case of the other two Americans.''
“We know that other families are desperate to get their loved ones home, and I told the president that we want them to come home too,” Ahmad Habibi added. “But anyone who suggests that my brother is dead is just reinforcing the Taliban's claims. We're grateful that President Biden has committed to not leaving Mahmoud behind,” and he said national security adviser Jake Sullivan has also made similar assurances.
The FBI declined to comment.
Courtesy of the Corbett family
Corbettwho speaks fluent Pashto, was working for local NGOs before starting a micro-loan and consulting business in Kabul when he was arrested with three accomplices — one German and two Afghans — while on a mission to northern Afghanistan in 2022.
Glezmann is an Atlanta native who was arrested while on a tourist trip in December 2022.
James Foley Foundation website
Ryan Corbett's family has publicly called on Mr. Biden to consider a deal to bring him and Glazman home.
“We hope that President Biden will have the courage to accept the deal in front of him, given that the lives of several Americans rest on his shoulders,” Erin Pelton, a spokeswoman for the Corbett family, told CBS News.
Corbett's wife, Anna Corbett, described the conversation with the president during an appearance on Fox News on Monday.
“He was very kind and compassionate, but I heard him say that he wasn't going to bring Ryan home, and it was just devastating,” Anna Corbett said. She accused Mr. Biden of refusing to agree to the terms of the Taliban deal. “He's not being accepted and it's incredibly hurtful for our family.”
In recent days, she has launched a public campaign to urge the new administration to seek her husband's release, and she traveled to President-elect Donald Trump's Mar-A-Lago residence in hopes of asking Trump in person. Neither Mr. Biden nor Mr. Trump has yet met her.
Anna Corbett told Fox News that Trump sent new national security adviser and current Florida representative Mike Waltz to meet with her. She said he spent more than an hour listening to her family's story. She expressed disappointment that it took more than a year to get a similar meeting with current national security adviser Jake Sullivan.
The Taliban are demanding the US release Muhammad Rahim al-Afghani, who is being held indefinitely at Guantanamo Bay. A source familiar with his case said the US intelligence community and the Pentagon oppose Rahim's release and cannot guarantee he no longer poses a threat to the US. However, the president can waive this if he decides it is in the best interest of the United States to complete the investigation of the detainee. swap
Rahim was captured in Pakistan in 2007 by the CIA and was the last detainee sent to Guantanamo Bay by the Bush administration in 2008. He has never been charged with war crimes, but the periodic review board deemed his continued detention in custody a national security imperative. His Intelligence profile 2016 describes him as an Al Qaeda courier.
In a statement confirming the phone call, the White House also noted that Mr Biden had been able to bring home US citizens who had been detained ahead of the US withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021. Corbett, Glazeman and Habibi were detained after traveling to Afghanistan following the Taliban's return to power. what Taliban rule followed a diplomatic deal made The Trump administration for the withdrawal of American troops and a surprisingly strong military offensive by the Taliban that caught the Biden administration off guard, leading to a hasty and chaotic Evacuation of the United States. Not wanting to be without American troops, NATO forces also withdrew.
The US does not officially recognize the Taliban, with its appalling human rights records, as the legitimate government of Afghanistan, but maintains contact with its leaders through US agencies as well as the Qatari government. Last weekend in Doha, the president's special envoy Roger Carstens and NSC official Jen Daskal pressed for a deal with the Taliban to free the Americans.
A US official described the meetings in Doha as unsuccessful, but declined to specify which other individuals the Biden administration is willing to offer to the Taliban as part of a potential trade. The White House described Biden's efforts as extending to the end of his term.
Mr. Biden has devoted much of his career to foreign policy, and this part his legacy extremely important for him. In a speech at the State Department on Monday, the president will describe the chaotic US withdrawal from Afghanistan, perhaps his biggest foreign policy failure, as a successful end to America's longest war.
contributed to this report.
