In the final hours of President Joe Biden’s term, a prisoner swap that had been in the works for years was finally carried out: the Taliban agreed to exchange two Americans detained in Afghanistan for a Taliban member serving a life sentence in a US prison.
But there was an unexpected delay, (at least in part due to bad weather in Washington and Kabul) and Donald Trump was officially back in the White House when Americans Ryan Corbett and William McKenty were delivered and were on their way home on Tuesday morning. -Friday (21).
The hostages were exchanged for Afghan Taliban member Khan Mohammed, convicted in 2008 on narco-terrorism charges.
Mohammed had been taken by US officials to Doha. Qatar facilitated the exchange by hosting several rounds of U.S. talks with the Taliban and also provided logistical support for operations to get the two American men out of Kabul, according to several people familiar with the details of the exchange.
The outgoing administration’s plan for the exchange was communicated to Trump’s national security adviser, Mike Waltz, by Biden’s adviser, Jake Sullivan.
“They are on board with this deal,” the Biden official said. “They recognized that and didn’t object.”
A senior Trump administration official rejected approving the swap.
“While we didn’t make the deal that the Biden administration made in the end, we are always happy to have two Americans home,” the Trump official said.
Biden’s hostage envoy, Ambassador Roger Carstens, was sent to Doha with Mohammed, a person familiar with the deal said.
Carstens’ time in government was also supposed to end when Trump took office, but he was already on the move during Monday’s presidential transfer of power.
A senior Biden administration official declined to say exactly where Mohammed would be handed over to the Taliban and the Americans would be picked up.
In addition to bad weather delaying things, one person briefed on the deal said the Taliban preferred to let Trump take the victory over the deal.
“They [o Talibã] they didn’t want the news to die during the inauguration and they want the Trump administration to get the credit,” the source said.
Carstens has helped lead efforts to have at least four Americans freed by the Taliban and recently met with representatives in Doha with a new offer.
Publicly, US officials discussed the release of Corbett and two others, George Glezmann and Mahmoud Habibi. All three were detained in 2022.
Little is known about McKenty and what he was doing in Afghanistan. The Biden White House declined to offer details, saying only that his case was known to them and that his family had previously asked for privacy surrounding his case.
“The Taliban rejected everything,” said a senior Biden administration official who discussed the talks on condition of anonymity, adding that they “put several significant offers on the table.”
“In the last few days [de Biden]there was a real effort, as always, to try to figure out if we can make progress with those who remain, who remain at the top of the mind of the president and the administration, even as he’s walking out the door,” the official said, while acknowledging that the next Trump administration will likely put additional pressure on the Taliban.
“The new administration has made several public statements about its expectation that Americans will be released from Afghanistan and that there would be consequences if that were not the case,” the official said. “I think the Taliban’s decision to act now on Ryan [Corbett] It’s partly motivated by that.”
Corbett and McKenty are expected to land around midday in the US, but their destination is unclear.
In the past, Americans held overseas have been taken to Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, which has a specialized program for reintegration.
Two years of negotiations
The release of the hostages is the result of two years of negotiations and multiple trips to Doha by White House and State Department officials to meet with Taliban representatives, a spokesman for Biden’s National Security Council said.
The CIA was also involved in the discussions and Tuesday’s operation.
Biden officials expressed disappointment that the other two Americans, Glezmann and Habibi, were not turned over, but said they could not refuse the offer of at least Corbett and McKenty.
The Taliban have never acknowledged holding Habibi, but the US still considers him a hostage.
The deal with the Taliban appears to have been relatively sudden: Earlier this month, Corbett’s wife, Anna, told Fox News that she had spoken with Biden and received no indication that her husband would be released before the inauguration.
“What I heard him say is he’s not going to bring Ryan home,” said Anna Corbett, who also met with Waltz, after traveling to Mar-a-Lago, uninvited, to try to meet with Trump.
There was no deal to speak of at the time, the senior Biden official responded, as they were still working on it “until the end.”
Corbett and his three teenage children were invited to the event by Trump’s hostage envoy, Adam Boehler.
In a statement to CNNthe family thanked members of the Trump and Biden teams, as well as the Qatari government.
