Taliban Say They Have Freed Westerners Working for U.N., Days After Quiet Detention

ISTANBUL — Hours after the United Nations announced that two Western citizens and their two Afghan colleagues working for the agency had been held by the Taliban for several days in Afghanistan, the Taliban said on Friday that they had released the Westerners.

The team members, including Andrew North, a British citizen and former BBC reporter, were on assignment with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and were detained in Kabul in recent days. “We are doing our utmost to resolve the situation, in coordination with others. We will make no further comment given the nature of the situation,” the U.N.’s initial statement said.

The confirmation was quickly picked up by international media, and the Taliban did not initially respond to requests for comment. But hours after the U.N. statement was released, the government’s chief spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid, said that the Westerners, at least, had been released. He made no mention of the situation of their two Afghan colleagues.

“Those foreigners who were said to be related to an international entity were arrested because they did not have the correct identification and permits,” he said. “They are in good health, and after their identities were verified they were released.”

People close to Mr. North confirmed that they had been in touch with him after his release. The U.N. Human Rights Commissioner’s office said it was still attempting to confirm the report.

The U.N.-commissioned team was investigating the cases of Afghans who had been internally displaced, following up on a previous trip in December. The Afghans involved were working as a driver and an interpreter.

More broadly, a growing body of accusations that the Taliban have been detaining Afghan civil society figures and protesters — including women’s rights campaigners, journalists and former members of the security forces — and reports of abuse of detainees have cast a long shadow over attempts by the Taliban to have international sanctions against them lifted in return for demonstrated improvement on human rights.

The U.N. have documented at least 100 extrajudicial killings of former security force members since the Taliban seized power in Afghanistan in August. But human rights groups say the real number is much larger, and they say there have been an increasing number of detentions and disappearances since then, as well. The Taliban have publicly denied any involvement in disappearances and killings, and say that they are abiding by a publicly announced pardon for former Afghan officials and security force members.

Among the accusations is that at least two women who had campaigned for improved rights, and three others close to them, were taken at gunpoint from their homes on Jan. 19, and have not been heard from since. The two activists have been identified as Tamana Zaryab Paryani and Parwana Ebrahim Khelby.

A video was posted on social media showed Ms. Paryani screaming for help and shouting that the Taliban were pounding on her door.

On Friday, a representative for the Foreign and Commonwealth and Development Office in London said that at least six British citizens in total were being held by the authorities in Afghanistan, and said that the United Nations was handling Mr. North’s case.

“We are providing support to the families of a number of British men who have been detained in Afghanistan,” the statement said. “U.K. officials have raised their detention with the Taliban at every opportunity, including when a delegation traveled to Kabul yesterday.”

The Taliban did not respond to a request for comment.

The news of the U.N. team’s detention was first posted by the former vice president of Afghanistan, Amrullah Saleh Friday, who said the Taliban was holding nine citizens of Western countries, among them Mr. North and Peter Jouvenal, a former journalist and businessman who ran a guesthouse, the Gandamack Lodge, in Kabul for many years. The two were detained in unrelated incidents.

Mr. Jouvenal, a dual British-German citizen, is among seven Western nationals, including one American and six British citizens, who were detained on various occasions at the end of last year. The Taliban has not publicly confirmed their detention or announced any charges against them, but British officials were given access to some of those being held this week.

Friends of Mr. Jouvenal issued a statement on Friday expressing deep concern for his safety. Mr. Jouvenal, who is a Muslim and is married to an Afghan, has been held in a jail of the Taliban’s intelligence arm in Kabul since being detained early December, his friends say. According to one of his friends, David Loyn, a former BBC reporter, he was visited by a British official last week.

“He is being held without charge, and with no freedom to contact his family or lawyers,” the statement said.

“Peter’s family and friends believe that he may have been detained in error, as he was in Afghanistan to discuss investments in Afghanistan’s mining industry as well as conducting family business. Before his arrest he was working openly and had frequent meetings with senior Taliban officials.”

President Biden raised the case also of Mark R. Frerichs, a United States Navy veteran who was working as a contractor in Afghanistan when he was kidnapped by the Haqqani Network of the Taliban two years ago.

“He has done nothing wrong,” Mr. Biden said in a statement last month on the anniversary of his kidnapping. “And yet, for two years the Taliban has held him captive.”

The president said Mr. Frerichs, a native of Illinois, had spent a decade helping the people of Afghanistan, and he warned the Taliban not to try to use Mr. Frerichs as a bargaining chip in their negotiations for recognition or the lifting of sanctions with the United States.

“Threatening the safety of Americans or any innocent civilians is always unacceptable, and hostage taking is an act of particular cruelty and cowardice,” he added. “The Taliban must immediately release Mark before it can expect any consideration of its aspirations for legitimacy. This is not negotiable.”

Through many years of the war, the Haqqani Network amassed a long record of kidnapping for ransom or for political leverage.

The leader of the Haqqani network, Sirajuddin Haqqani, served as the deputy leader of the Taliban during its insurgency against American forces and is now the acting Interior Minister in the Taliban government.