Haji Najibullah: Ex-Taliban commander pleads guilty of taking US journalist hostage

Haji Najibullah, a former Taliban commander, has pleaded guilty to kidnapping a US journalist and supporting deadly attacks on American soldiers.

The plea was made in a Manhattan federal court on Friday, in which Najibullah pleaded guilty to providing weapons and assistance to Taliban militants between 2007 and 2009.

Through an interpreter, he informed Judge Katherine Polk Failla that he knowingly helped the Taliban in conducting attacks against US troops in Afghanistan. "As a result of material support I provided to the Taliban, US soldiers were killed," he said.

Najibullah, 49, said he supplied guns, fighters, and actively participated in Taliban operations while leading in Afghanistan's Wardak Province. He explained how his unit employed suicide bombers, automatic rifles, roadside bombs, and rocket-propelled grenades in their operations.

"The fighters under me were prepared to, and sometimes did, conduct attacks against US soldiers and their allies," he added.

HOW REPORTERS WERE CAPTURED AND HELD HOSTAGE

In a press release, the US Attorney's Office said, "In or about November 2007 and September 2008, Najibullah participated in two video-recorded interviews with a French reporter in Afghanistan. Najibullah and fighters under his command discussed how they targeted American and French troops—including a specific attack they conducted against French troops in or around August 2008."

Najibullah also admitted to having a lead role in the kidnapping of David Rohde, a former New York Times journalist, Afghan journalist Tahir Ludin, and their driver Asadullah Mangal in 2008. The three were kidnapped en route to an interview with a Taliban leader on November 10, 2008.

Najibullah stated that the motive of the kidnapping was for ransom money and the release of the prisoners from the Taliban. "I created proof-of-life videos of David Rohde and his companions in which they were forced to convey the Taliban’s demands," he told the court.

Rohde and Ludin were detained for over seven months in a compound controlled by the Taliban in the tribal region of Pakistan before they escaped. Mangal, their driver, also escaped several weeks later. Rohde, a senior executive editor for national security at NBC News and Pulitzer Prize winner, was amongst the people who testified in court today.

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