Colin Mackenzie Rutherford is a

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

who was held captive by 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 ...

. In October 2010 Rutherford traveled to

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 ...

to pursue an interest in the country's ancient civilizations. Police informed his family he had been captured on November 4, 2010. The Taliban made a video of Rutherford public in May 2011.

Release

Rutherford was freed on January 11, 2016—the fourteenth anniversary of the opening of

Guantanamo Bay detention camp The Guantanamo Bay detention camp ( es, Centro de detención de la bahía de Guantánamo) is a United States military prison located within Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, also referred to as Guantánamo, GTMO, and Gitmo (), on the coast of Guant ...

s, in Cuba. Neither

Stephane Dion Stephane may refer to: * Stéphane Stéphane is a male French given name an equivalent of Stephen/Steven. Notable people with this given name include: * Stéphane Adam (born 1969), French footballer *Stéphane Agbre Dasse (born 1989), Burkinabé f ...

, Canada's new Minister of Foreign Affair, or Rutherford's mother, Wendy, agreed to an interview on the day of Rutherford's release. But his brother Brian shared his happiness, via email. Dion's press release thanked the government of Qatar for their help. In June 2015, retired Green Beret

Lieutenant Colonel Lieutenant colonel ( , ) is a rank of commissioned officers in the armies, most marine forces and some air forces of the world, above a major and below a colonel. Several police forces in the United States use the rank of lieutenant colone ...

Jason Amerine Jason Amerine (born 1971) is a retired lieutenant colonel in the United States Army Special Forces. He served in the Invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, in which he aided tribal leader Hamid Karzai in fighting a guerrilla war against the Taliban. F ...

testified before the United States Senate Armed Forces Committee about the American military's failure to free hostages in Afghanistan. Amerine told Congress he had prepared a rescue plan for Rutherford, and American Caitlin Coleman and her Canadian husband Joshua Boyle. The ''

National Post The ''National Post'' is a Canadian English-language broadsheet newspaper available in several cities in central and western Canada. The paper is the flagship publication of Postmedia Network and is published Mondays through Saturdays, with M ...

'' reported that Amerine said his rescue plan was ''"scuttled by U.S. government infighting"''.

Aftermath

Three days after his release Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau confirmed that Rutherford hadn't yet returned to Canada. During his captivity experienced commentators had asserted that the Taliban had probably moved him to Pakistan's Tribal Areas, but the Taliban released in Ghazni province, and said that this is where he had been held. Trudeau, like Dion, thanked Qatar for their assistance. Taliban spokesmen confirmed that Qatar had played a role. The Taliban spokesmen said they had released Rutherford ''"on grounds of humanitarian sympathy and sublime Islamic ethics."'' '' Yahoo News'' quoted comments from

Christian Leuprecht Christian Leuprecht (born 28 May 1971) is a former Italian male long-distance runner who competed at three editions of the IAAF World Cross Country Championships at senior level (1991, 1992, 1996). See also * List of European junior records in a ...

, of Canada's

Royal Military College Royal Military College may refer to: ;Australia * Royal Military College, Duntroon, Campbell, Australian Capital Territory ;Canada * Royal Military College of Canada, Kingston, Ontario * Royal Military College Saint-Jean, Saint-Jean, Quebec ;Mala ...

and

Queen's University Queen's or Queens University may refer to: *Queen's University at Kingston, Ontario, Canada *Queen's University Belfast, Northern Ireland, UK **Queen's University of Belfast (UK Parliament constituency) (1918–1950) **Queen's University of Belfast ...

. He suggested the Taliban had released Rutherford as a sign of good faith, in order to win a place at the peace talk table. He pointed out the brutal way Daesh executes prisoners, and asserted the Taliban wanted to remind those negotiating peace that they weren't brutal in the same way Daesh were. : However, according to '' The New York Times'', Rutherford was picked up by the FBI and United States Army Rangers after Qatar arranged a prisoner swap with the Afghan government.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rutherford, Colin 1983 births 2010s missing person cases Canadian auditors Foreign hostages in Afghanistan Formerly missing people Kidnapped Canadian people Living people Missing person cases in Afghanistan Place of birth missing (living people) Prisoners of the Taliban