KABUL, AFGHANISTAN – An American woman recently released from Taliban detention has issued a harrowing plea for a British couple, warning that they are “literally dying” in prison and that “time is running out.” Faye Hall, who was arrested alongside Peter, 80, and Barbie Reynolds, 76, on February 1, 2025, returned to the United States after two months in captivity, but the Reynolds remain in Afghanistan without a confirmed reason for their arrest.
In her first interview since her release, Ms. Hall described the couple’s rapidly deteriorating health. She noted that Barbie, a pensioner, has lost significant weight and was at one point unable to stand or walk. Peter, who has a history of heart surgery and cancer, is reportedly getting sicker despite receiving medication from the Qatari government. The couple’s son had previously told the BBC he feared they would die in prison, citing his father’s serious convulsions and his mother’s “numbness” from anaemia and malnutrition.
The UN had also issued a warning in July, calling the detention “inhumane” and stating that the couple could perish “in such degrading conditions” without immediate medical care.
Details of the Arrest and Detention
Peter and Barbie Reynolds, who married in Kabul in 1970 and had lived in Afghanistan for 18 years, possessed Afghan citizenship and ran a Taliban-approved charity program. Ms. Hall recounted that the group, including an interpreter, was arrested after a privately chartered flight from Kabul to Bamiyan Province. They were then subjected to days of being driven between various police stations and prisons. Ms. Hall described the conditions as “not a healthy environment,” including cramped cells and a maximum-security facility holding “murderers,” where guards were armed with machine guns.
International Diplomatic Response
Ms. Hall has called on the U.S. and UK governments to “work together” and do more to secure the couple’s release. The UK’s Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) confirmed it is supporting the family but emphasized that its ability to provide assistance is “severely limited” since the UK embassy in Kabul was shut down after the Taliban’s return to power in 2021.
A spokesperson for the U.S. State Department echoed the sentiment, stating that the Taliban has a “history of unjustly detaining foreign nationals” and urged them to end their practice of “hostage diplomacy.”
In a conflicting statement from July, the Taliban’s foreign minister claimed that the couple was “in constant contact with their families” and that their “human rights are being respected,” with full access to medical treatment and accommodation. However, he admitted that efforts to secure their release had not yet been completed.
