Bashir Noorzai is a convicted former Afghan

drug lord A drug lord, drug baron, kingpin or narcotrafficker is a high-ranking crime boss who controls a sizable network of people involved in the illegal drug trade. Such figures are often difficult to bring to justice, as they are normally not directly ...

. He was an early supporter of the

Taliban The Taliban (; ps, طالبان, ṭālibān, lit=students or 'seekers'), which also refers to itself by its state (polity), state name, the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is a Deobandi Islamic fundamentalism, Islamic fundamentalist, m ...

movement and later worked as an

undercover agent To go "undercover" (that is, to go on an undercover operation) is to avoid detection by the object of one's observation, and especially to disguise one's own identity (or use an assumed identity) for the purposes of gaining the trust of an indi ...

on behalf of the U.S. government. Despite being among America's most wanted drug traffickers, he agreed to come to

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

for a

debriefing Debriefing is a report of a mission or project or the information so obtained. It is a structured process following an exercise or event that reviews the actions taken. As a technical term, it implies a specific and active intervention process t ...

after being promised by his handlers that he would not be arrested. He was arrested ten days after his arrival. In the aftermath of Afghanistan take over by the Taliban, the group demanded that the US release him in exchange with an American engineer, Mark Frerichs, who was kidnapped by the group in January 2020.

Biography

He fought the

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

forces that

occupied ' (Norwegian: ') is a Norwegian political thriller TV series that premiered on TV2 on 5 October 2015. Based on an original idea by Jo Nesbø, the series is co-created with Karianne Lund and Erik Skjoldbjærg. Season 2 premiered on 10 October ...

Afghanistan Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bordere ...

from 1979 to 1989. He was left in charge of

Kandahar Kandahar (; Kandahār, , Qandahār) is a List of cities in Afghanistan, city in Afghanistan, located in the south of the country on the Arghandab River, at an elevation of . It is Afghanistan's second largest city after Kabul, with a population ...

after

Mullah Omar Mullah Muhammad Omar (; –April 2013) was an Afghan Islamic revolutionary who founded the Taliban and served as the supreme leader of Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001. Born into a religious family of Kandahar, Omar was educated at local '' ma ...

went into hiding. He provided explosives, weapons, and militia fighters to the

regime. Noorzai was in

Quetta Quetta (; ur, ; ; ps, کوټه‎) is the tenth List of cities in Pakistan by population, most populous city in Pakistan with a population of over 1.1 million. It is situated in Geography of Pakistan, south-west of the country close to the ...

when the

September 11 attacks The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercia ...

occurred, and soon afterwards returned to Afghanistan. In November 2001, he met with men he described as American military officials at

Spinboldak Spin Boldak ( ps, سپین بولدک) is a border town and the headquarters of Spin Boldak District in the southern Kandahar province of Afghanistan, next to the border with Pakistan. It is linked by a highway with the city of Kandahar to the n ...

, near the

Afghan-Pakistani border The Durand Line ( ps, د ډیورنډ کرښه; ur, ), forms the Pakistan–Afghanistan border, a international land border between Pakistan and Afghanistan in South Asia. The western end runs to the border with Iran and the eastern end to th ...

. Small teams of

U.S. Special Forces The United States Army Special Forces (SF), colloquially known as the "Green Berets" due to their distinctive service Berets of the United States Army, headgear, are a special operations special operations force, force of the United States Ar ...

and intelligence officers were in Afghanistan at the time, seeking the support of tribal leaders. According to his lawyer, Noorzai was taken to

, where he was detained and questioned for six days by the Americans about Taliban officials and operations. He agreed to work with them and was freed, and in late January 2002 he handed over 15 truckloads of weapons, including about 400 anti-aircraft missiles, that had been hidden by the Taliban in his tribe's territory. On 1 June 2004, he was sanctioned under the

Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act The Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act, better known as the Kingpin Act, is landmark federal legislation in the United States intended to address international narcotics trafficking by imposing United States sanctions on foreign persons ...

Arrest

In April 2005, U.S. authorities in

arrested Noorzai. He was charged with trying to smuggle more than

US$ The United States dollar (symbol: $; code: USD; also abbreviated US$ or U.S. Dollar, to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies; referred to as the dollar, U.S. dollar, American dollar, or colloquially buck) is the official ...

50 million worth of

heroin Heroin, also known as diacetylmorphine and diamorphine among other names, is a potent opioid mainly used as a recreational drug for its euphoric effects. Medical grade diamorphine is used as a pure hydrochloride salt. Various white and brow ...

into the United States. He is one of ten people and organizations on a U.S. list of most-wanted drug traffickers. RFE/RL looks at alleged ties between Afghanistan's former Taliban regime and the illegal narcotics trade in light of the Noorzai arrest. Noorzai was represented at his 2008 trial by New York high-profile criminal defense lawyer

Ivan Fisher Ivan S. Fisher (born 1943) is a prominent New York City criminal defense attorney. He represents white-collar clients and others targeted or charged in complex federal matters. In 1980, ''The New York Times'' listed him in the top five of cri ...

. The case has raised substantial questions about U.S. foreign policy abroad. In 2008 Noorzai was convicted of smuggling $50 million worth of

into the United States. On April 30, 2009, he appeared before Judge

Denny Chin Denny Chin (陳卓光; born April 13, 1954) is a Senior United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, based in New York City. He was a United States District Judge of the United States District Court f ...

, who sentenced Noorzai to

life imprisonment Life imprisonment is any sentence of imprisonment for a crime under which convicted people are to remain in prison for the rest of their natural lives or indefinitely until pardoned, paroled, or otherwise commuted to a fixed term. Crimes for ...

. ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' reported that the leadership vacuum in the drug trade, following Noorzai's capture, was filled by

Juma Khan Juma Khan, an ethnic Baluch from Afghanistan's Nimroz Province, is a drug lord with links to the Taliban. Juma Khan was an illiterate provincial drug smuggler from southwestern Afghanistan in the 1990s. He suddenly rose to national pro ...

. Khan was, in turn, captured in 2010. The '' Afghanistan Times'' reported that Taliban officials said Noorzai had been released, in the

United Arab Emirates The United Arab Emirates (UAE; ar, اَلْإِمَارَات الْعَرَبِيَة الْمُتَحِدَة ), or simply the Emirates ( ar, الِْإمَارَات ), is a country in Western Asia (The Middle East). It is located at th ...

, on July 16, 2019. They reported that he would join Taliban peace negotiators, in

Qatar Qatar (, ; ar, قطر, Qaṭar ; local vernacular pronunciation: ), officially the State of Qatar,) is a country in Western Asia. It occupies the Qatar Peninsula on the northeastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula in the Middle East; it sh ...

. They incorrectly reported he had been released from the Guantanamo detention camp. However, Noorzai was not released from prison. According to a Taliban spokesman, he was released from prison in exchange for Mark Frerichs and arrived in Afghanistan on September 19, 2022.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Noorzai, Bashar Incarcerated spies American spies Afghan people imprisoned abroad Prisoners and detainees of the United States federal government Afghan drug traffickers Living people People sanctioned under the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act Year of birth missing (living people)