US court sentences ex-Taliban commander to 42 years over Rohde kidnapping

WASHINGTON: A US court on Tuesday sentenced former Taliban commander Haji Najibullah to 42 years in prison after he pleaded guilty to hostage-taking and providing material support for terrorism in connection with the 2008 abduction of American journalist David Rohde, then a reporter for The New York Times.

Najibullah said in his guilty plea last year that he had backed Taliban members who intended to kill US troops and had helped kidnap Rohde, Afghan journalist Tahir Ludin and their driver, Asadullah Mangal, in 2008.

While handing down the sentence in the Federal District Court in Manhattan, Judge Katherine Polk Failla said Najibullah’s actions involved support for and facilitation of terrorist violence. She said the hostage-taking had been carried out with casual brutality and psychological torture.

Prosecutors had sought a life sentence, telling the court that it was difficult to imagine conduct more sinister and morally wrong than the hostage taking of civilians. They also said Najibullah bore responsibility for a 2008 attack by fighters under his command that killed three US service members and an Afghan interpreter, adding that some of the victims’ bodies were mutilated or burned.

In court filings, prosecutors described Najibullah as the head of a violent insurgent group focused on killing Americans and their allies. His lawyers, however, requested an 18-year sentence and said that although their client did not dispute that his support for the Taliban contributed to the 2008 deaths, he maintained that he neither took part in nor directed that attack and was not among the main overseers of the kidnapping.

Before sentencing, Najibullah apologised to Rohde in court.

"What happened to him was terrible, and I deeply regret my role in it", he stated.

He then went on to describe the suffering he said he had endured.

Rohde also addressed the court, naming the US service members and Afghan interpreter killed in the 2008 attack, and referring to the pain, loss and grief experienced by their relatives and friends. He also described hostage-taking as a cruel and cowardly crime.

Rohde had been working on research for a book and was trying to speak with Najibullah when he was abducted along with Ludin and Mangal. Prosecutors said Najibullah accused the three of being spies and questioned them about their families.

The captives were shown Taliban propaganda videos containing footage of beheadings. Prosecutors said Najibullah’s men spent months trying to use the hostages to secure ransom payments and the release of Taliban prisoners.

The three were also forced to make phone calls and record videos pleading for help, court papers said, including one in which Rohde asked for his life to be spared while a machine gun was pointed at his face.

After seven months in captivity, Rohde and Ludin escaped from a Taliban compound by using a piece of scavenged rope to climb down a wall at night before making their way to a Pakistani military base. Prosecutors said Mangal escaped around five weeks later during a firefight.