An older British couple held by the Taliban on unknown charges for eight months have been released, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer confirmed in a statement on Friday.
“This long-awaited news will come as a huge relief to them and their family,” he said.
Peter Reynolds, 80, and his wife, Barbie Reynolds, 76, lived in Afghanistan for 18 years and ran an education and training organization in the country’s central province of Bamiyan. They chose to remain in the country after the Taliban seized back power in 2021.
They were taken from their home on Feb. 1, 2025.
Qatari officials negotiated the couple’s release before they returned to the U.K..
Sarah Entwistle (L) sits with her parents, Barbie (C) and Peter Reynolds, after landing at the airport in Doha on Sept. 19, 2025. Peter and Barbie Reynolds have been freed in Afghanistan after several months in detention following mediation by Qatar, an official with knowledge of the release told AFP on Friday.
KARIM JAAFAR / Getty Images
“God is good, as they say in Afghanistan,” Barbie Reynolds said as she arrived at Kabul International Airport to leave the country, the Associated Press reported.
Mohammed bin Abdulaziz al-Khulaifi, Qatar’s minister of state for foreign affairs, thanked the United Kingdom and Afghanistan’s Taliban government “for the fruitful co-operation” in freeing the Reynolds, the outlet also wrote, adding that the couple made a stop in Doha to undergo medical checks before flying to the U.K..
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Family members for months had been calling for the release of the couple, and had expressed concerns for their health amid reports of abusive treatment.
While the Taliban rejected the abuse allegations, they have never explained what led to the couple’s detention.
Speaking in Doha ahead of her parents’ arrival, the couple’s daughter, Sarah Entwistle, said the family was grateful and relieved to be welcoming their loved ones back after their “incomprehensible detention by the Taliban.”
Entwistle also thanked the Qatari and British governments for securing her parents’ release.
“This experience has reminded us of the power of diplomacy, empathy, and international co-operation,” she told reporters.
Abdul Qahar Balkhi, a Taliban spokesperson, thanked Qatar for its “sincere efforts and mediation” regarding the Reynolds, who, he said, were handed over to Richard Lindsay, the U.K.’s special envoy for Afghanistan, the AP reported.
He did not specify which law the couple were alleged to have broken.
Peter Reynolds (R) holds the hands of his daughter Sarah Entwistle after landing at the airport in Doha on Sept. 19, 2025.
KARIM JAAFAR/ Getty Images
In July, United Nations experts who were granted access to the Reynolds while they were in detention determined that the couple’s physical and mental health had deteriorated rapidly and demanded that they be immediately transferred to a hospital for treatment.
According to the group of experts, the couple were being held in a maximum-security prison in underground cells with no access to sunlight until being transferred to an above-ground block.
Before that, they were detained and held separately.
Peter, while in prison, collapsed, suffered two eye infections and had been experiencing tremors in his head and down his left arm.
In addition to these “grave concerns” about Peter’s well-being, his children said he is prone to skin cancer on his face, which would require immediate medical attention.
Barbie, who has anemia, had been suffering from numbness and malnutrition.
Jonathan Reynolds, the couple’s son, told the BBC in July that both his parents’ lives were in grave danger.
“My dad was chained to murderers and criminals,” he said.
— with files from The Associated Press
© 2025 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
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