Family of American says he was freed by Taliban in swap

US veteran and civilian contractor Mark Frerichs (Charlene Cakora via AP)

An American contractor held hostage in Afghanistan for more than two years by the Taliban has been released, his family said on Monday, as a Taliban drug lord jailed by the United States was also freed and returned to Kabul.

Mark Frerichs, a Navy veteran who had spent more than a decade in Afghanistan as a civilian contractor, was abducted in January 2020 and was believed to have been held since then by the Taliban-linked Haqqani network.