A former Taliban commander was sentenced to 42 years in prison on Tuesday for crimes together with kidnapping a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and offering assist that led to the deaths of three American soldiers.
Haji Najibullah’s sentencing capped a daylong continuing in Manhattan federal court docket that featured a dramatic few moments when the reporter, David Rohde, confronted Najibullah and described how Najibullah took half in the kidnapping of him and two different males in 2008 in Afghanistan however was now “refusing to take responsibility as I look at him today.”
Rohde, who’s at present an MS NOW nationwide safety reporter and beforehand labored for The New York Times and different publications, instructed Judge Katherine Polk Failla that he was “surprised and disappointed” that Najibullah was making an attempt to blame others and circumstances for his function in the kidnapping of Rohde, one other journalist and a driver.
The males have been held for greater than seven months earlier than making a dramatic escape from a Taliban-controlled compound in Pakistan’s tribal areas.
In April 2025, Najibullah pleaded guilty to offering materials assist for acts of terrorism and conspiring to take hostages.
The bearded Najibullah, 50, who wore a black cranium cap in court docket Tuesday, admitted that he offered materials assist together with weapons to the Taliban from 2007 to 2009, understanding it could be used to kill US soldiers in Afghanistan.
Speaking by way of an interpreter, Najibullah apologized to Rohde and his household, saying “what happened to him was terrible, and I deeply regret my role in it.”
Standing at a lectern simply ft from Najibullah, Rohde stated it was Najibullah’s lies that led him to go to what he thought was an interview however what changed into an ambush.
“Hostage taking is a cruel and cowardly crime. Family members spend weeks and months thinking they have the power to save their loved one’s life,” Rohde stated, noting it’s “an illusion” as a result of households lack the leverage and huge sums wanted to meet ransom calls for.
Still, Rohde stated, the ache he and those that know him have suffered is dwarfed by the deaths of three US soldiers who have been killed by Najibullah’s cohorts in a separate operation.
Three instances, he named the soldiers as he spoke, changing into emotional about their deaths, the ache his household endured and his love for journalism.
In a statement afterward, appearing Attorney General Todd Blanche stated the case proves that “those who harm Americans and engage in acts of terrorism will be hunted down and brought to justice, no matter how long it takes.”
As she introduced the sentence, the decide praised Rohde for the work that he and his spouse have completed on behalf of the households of others who have been kidnapped.
She stated she stopped brief of giving Najibullah the life prison sentence that federal sentencing tips known as for as a result of he had pleaded responsible, sparing extra trauma for his victims, and as a result of he was subjected to harsh prison situations for six years, together with in the course of the pandemic.
But she rejected most of the arguments for leniency made by his protection lawyer, who requested an 18-year prison time period for his shopper as he portrayed him as doing what was needed to shield his homeland throughout warfare.
She stated fighters beneath his management attacked a convoy of soldiers, killing three of them.
“I don’t think he needed to pull the trigger, to decapitate a body, to be responsible for what happened,” Failla stated.
Rohde known as it the “biggest mistake of my life” to arrange an interview with Najibullah that resulted in the kidnapping and stated he wouldn’t have completed it if he knew Najibullah was behind the killing of American soldiers.
He famous throughout his assertion in court docket that the hostage takers had claimed he was a spy “when in fact I was a journalist” who was making an attempt to get the point of view of a Taliban commander “to understand their hopes, their lives and their worldview.”
Then, he repeated that he stays “a journalist and I could not be prouder of being part of this profession,” an announcement that briefly brought about him to get choked up.