Couple Held Hostage by Taliban Recount Grim Ordeal and How Beheading Was 'Always on the Table'
An American woman held hostage by the Taliban for five years says she was beaten and raped during her brutal captivity.
Caitlan Coleman Boyle, 31, was held with her husband, Canadian Joshua Boyle, after they were seized while traveling in Afghanistan. She gave birth to three children while they were imprisoned.
Boyle claimed their guards "hated children" and beat her eldest son for "making problems" or being "too loud." When she tried to protect him, she was hit as well, she said.
"I would get beaten or hit or thrown on the ground," she told ABC News in a television interview.
The threat of being beheaded was always present, she said.
Joshua Boyle said his wife suffered a broken cheekbone, and broke three bones in her hand while fighting back.
"She was very proud of that injury," he said.
She also said guards put something in her food that forced her to miscarry a daughter. When she tried to report that to the guards' superiors, she was raped in retaliation.
"They just kept saying that this will happen again if we don't stop speaking about the forced abortion, that this happened because we were trying to tell people what they had done and that it would happen again," her husband said.
The couple decided to speak out, they said, so that Taliban leaders could be tried for war crimes.
“Our focus is on trying to hold accountable those who have committed grave human rights violations against us and against others,” Caitlan Boyle said. “I lost a daughter. That was more of a crushing blow to me than the years. What they did was a crime against humanity by international law.”
They were kidnapped in eastern Afghanistan in 2012 and transported to Pakistan. They were moved several times, they said. He was shackled and the family was held in single rooms, sometimes underground, they said.
The family was freed in mid-October during a Pakistani army raid, according to accounts. Details about the rescue are unclear.
The Boyles are now living in Canada and said they weren't ready to release more details about their abduction or their liberation.
