Afghanistan: Taliban release British couple who had been held for months; had 'violated laws'

A British couple, who were detained in Afghanistan earlier this year, have been freed after the Qatari-mediated negotiations.

Barbie Reynolds , 76, and her husband Peter, 80, were taken into custody by the Taliban’s interior ministry on February 1 and moved to a maximum-security prison in Kabul in March, AP reported.

The couple have lived in Afghanistan for 18 years, running “Rebuild,” an organisation providing education and training programmes. Together since the 1960s, they married in Kabul in 1970.

"Two British nationals named Peter and Barbara Reynolds, who had violated the laws of Afghanistan, were released from custody today following the judicial process," Foreign Ministry spokesman Abdul Qahar Balkhi said on social media.

د پيټر او باربارا رېنولډز په نامه دوه تنه بريتانوي اتباع چې د افغانستان قوانين یې نقض کړي وو، له قضايي پروسې وروسته نن له بنده خلاص شول.

د ا.ا.ا د اتباعو مسايلو ته له سياسي او يا د معاملې له زاويې نه گوري.

هيله ده چې د اتباعو مسايل، خصوصا هغوی ته د کونسلي خدماتو وړاندې کېدل pic.twitter.com/vUlmR4fGqf

— Abdul Qahar Balkhi (@QaharBalkhi) September 19, 2025

He added that the government "does not view the matters of citizens from a political or transactional angle".



Their son Jonathan told Sky News in April his parents had "never heard one accusation or one charge". He said the British govt had offered to evacuate them when the Taliban took over, to which they replied: "Why would we leave these people in their darkest hour?

Qatar, an energy-rich nation on the Arabian Peninsula that mediated talks between the U.S. and the Taliban before the American withdrawal, assisted in releasing the Reynolds couple from Afghanistan, a diplomat said. The couple left Afghanistan on Friday. The diplomat spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive negotiations involved in the case.

Earlier this month, the Taliban said they had reached an agreement with US envoys on a prisoner exchange as part of an effort to normalise relations. The meeting came after the Taliban in March released US citizen George Glezmann, who was abducted while travelling through Afghanistan as a tourist. Afghanistan remains a focus of US President Donald Trump. On Thursday, while visiting the UK, Trump suggested that he was working to reestablish a US presence at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan. Zakir Jalaly, an official at the Taliban’s Foreign Ministry, dismissed the idea.

Reynolds couple were flown to Doha and are now on their way home to be reunited with their family.