Canadian hostage reveals captors murdered his daughter and raped his wife during Afghan kidnapping
A US-Canadian couple freed in Pakistan this week almost five years after being kidnapped have returned to Canada where the husband revealed one of his children had been murdered and his wife had been raped by their captors.
American Caitlan Coleman, 31, and her Canadian husband Joshua Boyle, 34, were kidnapped while backpacking in Afghanistan in 2012 by the Taliban-allied Haqqani network.
Pakistani troops rescued the family in the northwest of the country, near the Afghan border, on Wednesday. The US has long accused Pakistan of failing to fight the Haqqani group.
"The stupidity and the evil of the Haqqani network in the kidnapping of a pilgrim ... was eclipsed only by the stupidity and evil of authorising the murder of my infant daughter," Mr Boyle told reporters in a statement at Toronto's Pearson International Airport.
"And the stupidity and evil of the subsequent rape of my wife, not as a lone action, but by one guard, but assisted by the captain of the guard and supervised by the commandant."
He did not elaborate on what he meant by "pilgrim", or on the murder or rape. Ms Coleman, who is from Stewartstown, Pennsylvania, and their three children who were all born in captivity, were not at the news conference.
"Obviously, it will be of incredible importance to my family that we are able to build a secure sanctuary for our three surviving children to call a home," Mr Boyle added.
Mr Boyle said the Taliban, who he referred to by their official name - the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan - had carried out an investigation last year and conceded that the crimes against his family were perpetrated by the Haqqani network.
He called on the Taliban "to provide my family with the justice we are owed".
"God willing, this litany of stupidity will be the epitaph of the Haqqani network," he said.
His statement came after Ms Coleman's parents revealed they were furious with their son-in-law for taking their pregnant daughter to Afghanistan.
"Taking your pregnant wife to a very dangerous place, to me, and the kind of person I am, is unconscionable," Coleman's father, Jim, told ABC News.
Linda Boyle said she had spoken to her son three times since his release.
“I have not wiped the smile off of my face,” she said.
Mr Boyle revealed dramatic details of their rescue to his family in phone calls.
The five of them were crammed into the boot of the kidnappers’ car when a deadly shoot-out forced it to a halt. Five of the captors were shot dead by the Pakistani army and Mr Boyle suffered minor shrapnel wounds, he told his parents.
An unknown number of the kidnappers, believed to be from the Taliban-allied Haqqani network, fled on foot.
One of the three children was in poor health and had to be force-fed by their Pakistani rescuers, Mr Boyle told reporters.
“He knows who the people are and he wants to make sure that they’re all prosecuted,” said Ms Boyle. She added that her son views the Pakistani Army as “heroes” for securing the family’s freedom.
In a video posted by the Toronto Star, Mr Boyle’s father Patrick expressed the couple’s “profound thanks for the courageous Pakistani soldiers who risked their lives and got all five out safely in the rescue.”
Ms Boyle said she had yet to know the full horror endured by her son and daughter-in-law endured since they were kidnapped in early October 2012 when they crossed into Afghanistan during a backpacking trip through Central Asia.
“They were held the entire time in an underground prison,” Ms Boyle said that Josh told her during one of their phone calls on Thursday.
The couple's two sons aged four and two were born during the couple's time in captivity. Mr Boyle helped deliver the second boy, said Ms Boyle. There is also a baby girl, who was either born two months ago – as Mr Boyle told his mother – or four months ago, as her Canadian passport reads.
“But maybe when you’re kept in an underground prison, you have no sense of time,” said Ms Boyle.
She said the reunited family would live together in their three-bedroom home in the Ottawa area.
The operation to free the family has raised fresh questions about Pakistan’s relationship with militant groups and whether any deal was done.
Donald Trump’s administration has increased pressure on the country’s security forces to disavow groups such as the Haqqani network which it has used in the past to hold influence in neighbouring Afghanistan.
Michael Kugelman, a South Asia specialist at the Woodrow Wilson Centre, said: "I don't think it's a coincidence that this hostage release was announced when you have a parade of top Trump administration officials in Islamabad to deliver strongly worded warnings to Pakistan.”
For his part, Mr Trump credited Pakistan for “working in conjunction” with the US government in securing the release of the Boyle-Coleman family.
Ms Boyle said she was unsure “what role Canada played” in extricating her son and his young family from captivity.
On Thursday morning, Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland issued a statement in which she said that Canada “has been actively engaged” with the US, Afghan and Pakistani governments, but later told reporters that she was “not at liberty to describe the circumstances” of the family’s release.
“We were not on the inside of anything and were pretty much kept in the dark,” said Ms Boyle.
