Taliban Again Denies Detention of Mahmood Shah Habibi
The Taliban administration has again denied detaining Mahmood Shah Habibi in Afghanistan’s prisons, as US pressure grows for clarity on his fate. Zabihullah Mujahid, the Taliban administration’s spokesman, said no one by that name is being held in prisons in Afghanistan.
Mujahid added that Taliban officials have also raised the issue in direct meetings with US officials. According to him, if Habibi were imprisoned in Afghanistan, the matter would have been resolved by now.
The remarks come as the US State Department’s Rewards for Justice program has offered a reward of up to $5 million for information leading to the location, recovery and return of Mahmood Shah Habibi. The US chargé d’affaires for Afghanistan also announced the reward in Persian and Pashto on his X account on Tuesday, Aug. 20.
Mahmood Shah Habibi, the former head of Afghanistan’s Civil Aviation Authority, disappeared in Kabul on Aug. 10, 2022. According to an FBI statement, he was detained along with his driver and 29 employees of a telecommunications company; most of them were later released, but there has still been no word on Habibi and one other person.
The Civil Aviation Authority is considered one of the key institutions in regulating flights and aviation services in Afghanistan. Habibi’s case is one that US officials have repeatedly raised in recent months and remains unanswered.
