Taliban’s Prisoner Exchange: Insights into the Release of Osama bin Laden’s Assistant and an American Detainee
Watan-Media outlets revealed on Sunday that the Afghan Taliban movement had struck a deal that included the release of an American prisoner in exchange for Washington releasing the Afghan assistant to former Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.
Informed sources disclosed that the American side had struck a deal with the Taliban, which included an American prisoner held by the movement in exchange for releasing the assistant to bin Laden.
Mohammed Rahim, who is he, Osama bin Laden’s assistant?
According to reports cited by “independentarabia” from “Al Arabiya Al-Hadath” channel, America agreed to release Mohammed Rahim Al-Afghani, who worked as a personal assistant to Osama bin Laden, along with another Afghan prisoner, in exchange for the release of the American detainee in Taliban prisons, “Ryan Corbett”.
Mohammed Rahim, born in 1965, an Afghan, was held by the United States in Guantanamo Bay.
He was born in eastern Afghanistan. Mohammed Rahim worked in an Afghan government committee that worked on eliminating opium poppy in the country, and the Taliban forced him to leave his job.
In 1979, Rahim fled Afghanistan with his brother across the Pakistani border. The reason for their departure was the Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan. They were arrested by Pakistani forces in 2007 while Rahim was riding a public bus in Lahore and later transferred to the famous Guantanamo prison in 2008.
Corbett’s Arrest
Taliban intelligence arrested Corbett on August 10, 2022, just days after the killing of Al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri in Kabul.
The reason for his arrest dates back to his accusation of spying for the United States and his connection to revealing Al-Zawahiri’s residence in the diplomatic area of the capital Kabul.
Anna Corbett, the wife of the American detainee with the Taliban, appealed to the Afghan government for the release of her husband, Ryan Corbett, who founded a commercial consulting company in 2017 and left Kabul with his family after the withdrawal of US forces, but returned in January 2022 to resume his work, only to be arrested by Afghan authorities.
According to the website freeryancorbett, Ryan has been detained by the Taliban in a basement cell. Since his arrest on August 10, his family had a 6-minute call with him in May of the same year, another 10-minute call, and a third 6-minute call in December 2023.
The last time anyone other than Taliban detainees saw Ryan was in December 2023 when a Qatari delegation visited him. Western detainees recently released who were held in the same conditions mentioned that Ryan is in poor health and cannot receive adequate medical care.
The Qatari capital, Doha, witnessed the signing of a peace agreement between the United States and the Taliban on February 29, 2020, to end a 19-year-long war between them.
The agreement came in response to the movement’s demand for “direct” negotiations with the United States, which lasted for nearly 14 months, when Washington agreed to direct negotiations with the movement, implementing the strategy of withdrawal from Afghanistan.
