KABUL (AFP) – The Taliban 
government said Tuesday it had released two American citizens from prison in return for an Afghan fighter held in the United States, in a deal brokered by Qatar.
Discussions about the prisoner exchange were confirmed last year, but the swap was announced after outgoing U.S. president Joe Biden handed over to Donald Trump, who was inaugurated on Monday.
“An Afghan fighter Khan Mohammed imprisoned in America has been released in exchange for American citizens and returned to the country,” the Afghan foreign ministry said in a statement.
The ministry said Mohammed had been serving a life sentence in California after being arrested “almost two decades ago” in the eastern Afghan province of Nangarhar.
Taliban government spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid told AFP two U.S. nationals had been released, declining to provide any further details on the exchange.
The family of U.S. citizen Ryan Corbett, who was detained by the Taliban in 2022, confirmed he was released and expressed “overwhelming gratitude” that he was coming home.
“Today, our hearts are filled with overwhelming gratitude and praise to God for sustaining Ryan’s life and bringing him back home after what has been the most challenging and uncertain 894 days of our lives,” the family said on their website.
They thanked both the Biden and Trump administrations, as well as Qatar, for Corbett’s freedom, and called for two other Americans still held in Afghanistan to be released.
U.S. media named William McKenty as the second released American detainee, noting little was known about what he was doing in Afghanistan and that his family had asked the U.S. government for privacy in his case.
The New York Times said two other Americans remain in detention in Afghanistan, former airline mechanic George Glezmann and naturalized American Mahmood Habibi.
In August 2024, the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation said it was seeking information about the disappearance of Afghan-American businessman Habibi two years previously.
Biden came under heavy criticism for the chaotic withdrawal of U.S. forces from Afghanistan in 2021, more than a year after Trump presided over a deal with the Taliban insurgents to end U.S. and NATO involvement in the two-decade war.