Please ensure Javascript is enabled for purposes of website accessibility

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott Signs Law Redrawing Congressional Maps

15 hours ago

US Air Force will Offer Military Funeral Honors to Slain Capitol Rioter

16 hours ago

US Republican Senator Joni Ernst Will Not Run for Re-Election, CBS News Reports

18 hours ago

Wall Street Falls as Dell, Nvidia Drive Tech Losses

18 hours ago

US Denies Visas to Palestinian Officials Ahead of UN General Assembly

20 hours ago

Minneapolis Children Revealed Courage, Absorbed Fear During Church Shooting

2 days ago

Ford Recalls Nearly 500,000 Vehicles Over Brake Fluid Leak

2 days ago

Fresno-Bound Passenger Says Delta Attendant Slapped Him, Seeks $20M

2 days ago
How a CIA Hit on Al Qaeda Ensnared a US Citizen in Afghanistan
Reuters logo
By Reuters
Published 3 weeks ago on
August 9, 2025

Ahmad Habibi and his younger brother Mahmood Habibi pose for the camera, Canada, 2014. Mahmood Habibi was taken hostage by the Taliban in Afghanistan on August 10, 2022, the U.S. government says. Ahmad Shah Habibi/Handout via REUTERS

Share

Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

As a crowd looked on, uniformed Taliban surrounded the Toyota Landcruiser in which Mahmood Habibi, a naturalized U.S. citizen, sat. Other Taliban smashed open the door of his Kabul apartment, emerging later with his laptop and papers.

Blindfolded in the back seat, Habibi and his driver were driven off by gunmen sporting shoulder patches of the Taliban’s feared secret police, the General Directorate of Intelligence (GDI), according to several witness statements in U.S. government possession seen by Reuters.

Afghanistan’s Taliban government denies it detained Habibi, 37, who was a former head of Afghanistan’s civil aviation. While dividing his time between the United States and Kabul working for a private company, he became a U.S. citizen after the Taliban took power in 2021. The Taliban also says they have no knowledge of his whereabouts, three years after he disappeared.

That is contradicted by the witness accounts and other evidence, including data monitored from Habibi’s cellphone, described to Reuters by a U.S. official and a former U.S. official familiar with the matter.

The Taliban denials present a conundrum for the FBI, which is leading the U.S. government effort to gain his release; and for the State Department, which describes Habibi’s detention a major impediment to exploring increased engagement with Afghanistan, three years after his August 10, 2022 arrest.

U.S. President Donald Trump has made freeing Americans held abroad a top priority and already has secured the release of dozens, including from Afghanistan, Russia and Venezuela.

The case of Habibi – the only publicly identified American held in the country – has been harder to resolve.

This story is the most comprehensive account to date of the circumstances of Habibi’s capture and includes previously unreported details.

Among them, interviews with the U.S. official and a former U.S. official with knowledge of the case reveal that the Taliban likely detained Habibi because the CIA had penetrated the company where he worked. The sources say the U.S. spy agency had accessed one of the company’s security cameras, helping it pinpoint the al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri in a Kabul guesthouse.

Habibi’s detention came 10 days after Zawahiri – the last of the top plotters of the September 11, 2001, attack on the United States – was dramatically assassinated by a U.S. drone strike on the guesthouse, ordered by Trump’s predecessor, Joe Biden.

At the time, U.S. officials briefed journalists that it was a CIA operation. The U.S. sources told Reuters that Habibi was unaware of the CIA plot and was wrongly detained after returning to Kabul from a work trip to Dubai after the assassination, oblivious of the danger he was in.

The CIA, the Taliban, the White House and Habibi’s employer, Virginia-based ARX Communications, did not respond to detailed requests for comment for this story. ARX has previously said neither it, nor its subsidiaries, were involved with the strike on Zawahiri. Reuters could not independently verify whether Habibi was or wasn’t aware of the plot.

In a statement to Reuters, a State Department spokesperson called for Habibi’s immediate release.

“We know the Taliban abducted Mahmood Habibi nearly three years ago,” the spokesperson said.

A co-worker detained with Habibi, then later released, saw him in GDI headquarters and heard him in an adjacent room being asked if he worked for the CIA or was involved in the strike on Zawahiri, according to one of the statements in U.S government possession, seen by Reuters.

Then, in June and August of 2023, the U.S. government detected that his mobile phone had been switched on in GDI headquarters, the U.S. official and former official said.

Reuters could not reach the witnesses who made statements, including the coworker, or verify the accuracy of their account of Habibi’s detention. The U.S. official familiar with the matter said excerpts of the statements have been presented to the Taliban in response to their repeated denials of Habibi’s detention.

As Habibi and his family on Sunday mark the third anniversary of his arrest, the Trump administration has stepped up efforts to win his release, including offering a $5 million reward for information. But so far, he appears no closer to freedom, the U.S. sources said.

“Our family has new hope that the Trump team will be successful,” said Habibi’s older brother, Ahmad.

Ahmad said his brother would never have gone to Kabul four days after the Zawahiri assassination if the CIA had told ARX to warn him it was too dangerous to return.

“Nobody told him anything. Neither the company, neither the CIA nor anybody. So, he just went back,” Ahmad said.

The U.S. government officially considers Habibi a hostage, said the U.S. official, because his arrest and location remain unconfirmed by the Taliban. The official and the former official spoke on condition of anonymity, citing the sensitivity of the case.

In response to a request for comment, the FBI said that along with partners in other U.S. departments involved in hostage recovery, it remains “committed to bringing Habibi home to his family.”

The Taliban rejected an offer made last year to trade Habibi for alleged Osama bin Laden aide Mohammad Rahim al-Afghani, the last Afghan held in the Guantanamo Bay military prison.

“We’ve tried in terms of both carrots and sticks,” said the official, who requested anonymity to discuss the case.

The Taliban “literally throw up a wall,” said the official.

Camera on Cell Tower

As part of the operation against Zawahiri, the CIA penetrated the Asia Consultancy Group (ACG), a subsidiary of ARX, according to the current and former U.S. officials, who provided previously unreported details of how the spy agency was able to target the al Qaeda chief. Reuters presented these details to the CIA, ACG and ARX, requesting comment, but received no response.

ACG, whose parent is headquartered in Herndon, Virginia, had a contract to erect cellphone towers around Kabul, the sources said. CCTV cameras were fitted to the towers to protect the structures, they said.

One of the cameras, the sources said, was pointed at a house U.S. officials have linked to Sirajuddin Haqqani, the Taliban’s acting interior minister both at the time and now, in the heart of Kabul’s diplomatic quarter, a short distance from the shuttered British and American embassies.

The sources said the camera sent back video to the CIA confirming Zawahiri’s presence in the residence.

That confirmation helped the agency kill the Egyptian Islamist with two drone-fired Hellfire R9X missiles on July 31, 2022, as he emerged onto a balcony, they said. His wife and family survived the strike.

While officials in the Biden administration at the time described the CIA’s drone operation to kill Zawahiri with Hellfires, the details of the agency’s operation on the ground, including the presence of the camera and its role in identifying Zawahiri have not been previously disclosed.

Arrest

On the day of his arrest, Mahmood Habibi was in his apartment in Kabul’s Sherpur neighborhood packing to return to New Jersey, where he had a home, with the help of a sister, who was there with her two children, according to Ahmad.

It was about noon when a phone call came from the ACG office saying it had just been raided by the Taliban, Ahmad said. Habibi told his sister that he had to leave without explaining why. He was arrested immediately after getting into his vehicle, Ahmad said.

A few minutes later, somebody announcing that they were with GDI knocked on his apartment door, according to Ahmad and a witness statement. His sister declined to open it, telling those outside that she had to conform to the Taliban rule that an adult male relative had to be present.

The Taliban broke open the door, entered the apartment and rifled through closets and drawers, demanding Habibi’s laptop, according to Ahmad and the witness statement.

A crowd had gathered outside after the Taliban arrived in five vehicles, blocked the street and surrounded Habibi’s car, before driving him off, according to Ahmad and a separate witness statement.

The GDI arrested 30 other ACG employees, according to a letter that ACG sent to Afghanistan’s Ministry of Communications, seen by Reuters. Except for Habibi and one other, all were eventually released.

In the letter, dated September 15, 2022, ACG asked that family members be allowed to visit him and three other staff who the GDI still held.

The ministry appeared to confirm Habibi was a GDI prisoner in a reply two days later, seen by Reuters, saying that the intelligence directorate would decide on the petition when its investigation was completed.

However, in a July 3, 2025 statement reported by Afghanistan’s state news agency, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said that in response to requests from Habibi’s family, the Taliban had investigated but no evidence has been found to suggest that he was detained by Afghanistan’s security forces.

Mujahid said the Taliban are a legitimate governing body that does not detain individuals without due process or hide them from public view. Mujahid did not respond to a Reuters request for comment.

US Citizen

Born to parents from the southern city of Kandahar, Habibi is one of eight siblings – three brothers and five sisters – who grew up in the Kabul neighborhood of Karte Parwan.

His excellent English helped him secure a job with the U.N. civil aviation agency in Kabul in 2008. He worked for the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration’s U.S. embassy office from 2011 to 2013.

Tapped as deputy civil aviation minister, Habibi helped transition Afghanistan’s air traffic system from U.S. control to the U.S.-backed Kabul government. Habibi became civil aviation minister in 2017. He held that post until 2019 while earning a civil aviation master’s degree from Embry Riddle Aeronautical University in Florida, the university confirmed.

In 2019, he resigned and then joined ARX to help oversee its Afghan subsidiary’s contract to run air traffic control at Kabul’s international airport. Habibi lived between the city and the United States, accumulating the last of the 30 months of U.S. residency he needed over a five-year period for U.S. citizenship in 2021, Ahmad said.

He was in Kabul with his family during the chaotic departure of the last U.S. troops in August 2021, Ahmad said, as the Taliban consolidated its grip on the capital after 20 years of war.

Habibi flew from Dubai to Kabul on August 4, 2022, after stopping in Qatar to check on his family and parents who were housed on a U.S. military base there waiting for final processing of U.S. immigration visas, said Ahmad. A week later Habibi was arrested.

His wife, daughter and parents, who waited in Qatar until October for their visas before flying to the United States and settling in California, have not seen or heard from him since.

Resolving Habibi’s case would be the easiest way for the Taliban, who crave international recognition as Afghanistan’s legitimate rulers, to explore improving ties with the U.S., the current U.S. official said.

Since Habibi’s detention, four other Americans have been arrested and released by the Taliban.

(Reporting by Jonathan Landay; Additional reporting by Saeed Shah in Islamabad; Editing by Frank Jack Daniel)

RELATED TOPICS:

DON'T MISS

What Are Fresno Real Estate Experts Predicting for 2025 and Beyond?

DON'T MISS

First California EV Mandates Hit Automakers This Year. Most Are Not Even Close

DON'T MISS

Gov. Newsom Launches New Task Force To Clear CA Homeless Encampments

DON'T MISS

Fresno Supervisor Nathan Magsig Says Crews Gaining Ground on Garnet Fire

DON'T MISS

Judge Allows Release of Accused Arsonist Bobby Salazar on $1M Bond

DON'T MISS

Valley Crime Stoppers’ Most Wanted Person of the Day: Curtis Wayne Recek

DON'T MISS

Fresno Area Schools Prep for Football With Stout Security Measures

DON'T MISS

Fresno Blaze Damages Yosemite Falls Café, Restaurant to Remain Closed

DON'T MISS

Florida Man Indicted for Fentanyl Smuggling Scheme Using Drones

DON'T MISS

Egypt Rounds up Teenaged TikTokkers in Crackdown on Social Media

DON'T MISS

Fresno Shelter Helps Homeless Recover from Hospital Stays. It’s Also a ‘Good Neighbor’

DON'T MISS

Drive-Thru Debate Heats Up at Fresno City Council Meeting

UP NEXT

Judge Allows Release of Accused Arsonist Bobby Salazar on $1M Bond

UP NEXT

Valley Crime Stoppers’ Most Wanted Person of the Day: Curtis Wayne Recek

UP NEXT

Fresno Area Schools Prep for Football With Stout Security Measures

UP NEXT

Fresno Blaze Damages Yosemite Falls Café, Restaurant to Remain Closed

UP NEXT

Florida Man Indicted for Fentanyl Smuggling Scheme Using Drones

UP NEXT

Egypt Rounds up Teenaged TikTokkers in Crackdown on Social Media

UP NEXT

Fresno Shelter Helps Homeless Recover from Hospital Stays. It’s Also a ‘Good Neighbor’

UP NEXT

Drive-Thru Debate Heats Up at Fresno City Council Meeting

UP NEXT

Fresno Labor Day Traffic Alert for Motorists Using Maroa Avenue

UP NEXT

Turkey Bars Israeli Ships from Its Ports and Restricts Airspace

Valley Crime Stoppers’ Most Wanted Person of the Day: Curtis Wayne Recek

11 hours ago

Fresno Area Schools Prep for Football With Stout Security Measures

12 hours ago

Fresno Blaze Damages Yosemite Falls Café, Restaurant to Remain Closed

12 hours ago

Florida Man Indicted for Fentanyl Smuggling Scheme Using Drones

12 hours ago

Egypt Rounds up Teenaged TikTokkers in Crackdown on Social Media

12 hours ago

Fresno Shelter Helps Homeless Recover from Hospital Stays. It’s Also a ‘Good Neighbor’

13 hours ago

Drive-Thru Debate Heats Up at Fresno City Council Meeting

13 hours ago

Judge Blocks Enforcement of Texas Law Restricting DEI and ESG Advice

14 hours ago

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott Signs Law Redrawing Congressional Maps

15 hours ago

Trump Cancels $4.9 Billion in Foreign Aid, Escalating Spending Fight with Congress

15 hours ago

Gov. Newsom Launches New Task Force To Clear CA Homeless Encampments

This story was originally published by CalMatters. Sign up for their newsletters. Gov. Gavin Newsom launched a new homeless response task fo...

10 hours ago

City worker in protective gear removes belongings near a yellow tent during a homeless encampment cleanup at an urban transit stop.
10 hours ago

Gov. Newsom Launches New Task Force To Clear CA Homeless Encampments

Fresno County’s Garnet Fire has burned 17,159 acres with 8% containment as of Friday, Aug. 29, 2025, prompting evacuations while officials confirm the cause and some areas remain open for Labor Day. (U.S. Forest Service)
10 hours ago

Fresno Supervisor Nathan Magsig Says Crews Gaining Ground on Garnet Fire

Bobby Salazar motorcycle gang fire restaurant Blackstone fresno insurance fraud
11 hours ago

Judge Allows Release of Accused Arsonist Bobby Salazar on $1M Bond

Curtis Wayne Recek is Valley Crime Stoppers' Most Wanted Person of the Day for August 29, 2025. (Valley Crimes Stoppers)
11 hours ago

Valley Crime Stoppers’ Most Wanted Person of the Day: Curtis Wayne Recek

12 hours ago

Fresno Area Schools Prep for Football With Stout Security Measures

Fire at Yosemite Falls Cafe on Friday, Aug. 29, 2025. (Fresno FD)
12 hours ago

Fresno Blaze Damages Yosemite Falls Café, Restaurant to Remain Closed

The seal of the U.S. Justice Department is seen on the podium in the Department's headquarters briefing room before a news conference with the Attorney General in Washington, January 24, 2023. (Reuters File)
12 hours ago

Florida Man Indicted for Fentanyl Smuggling Scheme Using Drones

Abdulrahman Hisham, 20, an Egyptian social media content creator, looks at his page with several videos, amid a wave of cases prompting Egypt to consider tighter regulations on social media platforms at his residence in n Cairo, Egypt August, 20, 2025. REUTERS/Amr Abdallah Dalsh
12 hours ago

Egypt Rounds up Teenaged TikTokkers in Crackdown on Social Media

Search

Help continue the work that gets you the news that matters most.

Send this to a friend