Family of American man believed to be held by Taliban asks the UN torture investigator for help

WASHINGTON — Lawyers for an American believed to have been held by the Taliban for nearly two years are asking a United Nations human rights investigator to intervene, citing what they say is cruel and inhumane treatment.

Ryan Corbett was kidnapped on August 10, 2022, after returning to Afghanistan, where he and his family lived at the time of the collapse of the US-based government there a year earlier. He arrived on a valid 12-month visa to pay and train staff as part of a business venture he led aimed at promoting Afghanistan’s private sector through consultancy services and loans.

Corbett has since been bounced between multiple prisons, although his lawyers say he has not been seen by anyone other than the people he was held with since December last year.

In a petition sent Thursday, Corbett’s lawyers say he has been threatened with physical violence and torture, is malnourished and has no medical care. He is in solitary confinement, including in a basement cell with virtually no sunlight or exercise, and his physical and mental health has deteriorated significantly, the lawyers say.

Corbett has been able to speak to his family by phone five times since his arrest, including last month. His family has not been able to see him — his only visits have been two third-party check-ins — and their characterizations of his abuse are based on stories from recently released inmates who were with him and his openly discouraged tone in his speech. conversations.

“During Mr. Corbett’s most recent telephone conversation with his wife and children, Mr. Corbett indicated that the mental torture and fear had caused him to lose all hope,” said the petition, signed by the Corbett family’s lawyers, Ryan Fayhee and Kate Gibson.

The petition is addressed to Alice Edwards, an independent human rights researcher and the Special Rapporteur on Torture at the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. It calls on Edwards, who has been appointed by the UN Human Rights Council, to “urgently reach out to the Taliban to secure Mr Corbett’s immediate release and freedom from torture as guaranteed by international law.”

“This situation is dragging on, and I am becoming increasingly concerned and taking steps that I hope will make a difference and help the situation – I am just becoming increasingly concerned and panicked about the deteriorating health and physical and mental Ryan’s health,” said Corbett’s wife Anna. said in an interview. “And that led me to take this next step.”

The U.S. government is working separately to bring Corbett home and has classified him as wrongfully detained. A State Department spokesperson told reporters last month that officials had consistently pushed for Corbett’s release and were “using every lever we could to try to bring Ryan and these other wrongfully detained Americans home from Afghanistan.”

A spokesman for the Ministry of Interior in Afghanistan said this week that it had no knowledge of Corbett’s case.

Corbett, of Dansville, New York, first visited Afghanistan in 2006 and moved there with his family in 2010, where he oversaw several nongovernmental organizations.

The family was forced to leave Afghanistan in August 2021 when the Taliban captured Kabul, but he returned in January so he could renew his business visa. Given the instability on the ground, the family discussed the trip and “we were all quite nervous,” Corbett’s wife said.

But after that first uneventful trip, he returned to the country in August 2022 to train and pay his staff and resume a business venture that included consulting services, microfinance loans and evaluating international development projects.

During a trip to the northern province of Jawzjan, Corbett and a Western colleague were confronted by armed members of the Taliban and were taken first to a police station and later to an underground prison.

Anna Corbett said when she heard her husband had been taken to a police station she became “really scared” but was optimistic the situation would be resolved quickly.

However, that hasn’t happened, and Anna Corbett, who has three teenage children and regularly travels to Washington, said she is trying to advocate as strongly as she can without letting “fear take over.”

“I feel like it’s the uncertainty of it all that’s so hard, because you just don’t know what’s coming your way — what call, what news,” she said. “And I worry about Ryan and the effect of the trauma on him and then on my children, exactly what they are experiencing. I have tried to protect them as best I can, but this is so difficult.”

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Associated Press writer Riazat Butt in Kabul, Afghanistan, contributed to this report.