Five years in captivity, Canadian family free at last

By Barry Ellsworth

TRENTON, Ont.

Canadian Joshua Boyle said Saturday the Taliban terrorist network that abducted he and his American wife in Afghanistan targeted the couple because she was pregnant and believed it would be easy to get ransom money.

But when the baby was born in captivity and the money was not forthcoming from the American government, members of the Haqqani network murdered the infant and raped his spouse, Caitlan Coleman.

Boyle spoke to Canadian media after the family – including three additional children born during the couple’s captivity – arrived late Friday at Toronto’s Pearson airport and then again early Saturday after the family journeyed to Boyle’s parents’ home in Smiths Falls, about 350 kilometers east of Toronto.

He said he and Coleman went to Afghanistan in the summer of 2012 to help villagers there. Boyle was bitter about the actions of the terrorists.

“(The) stupidity and evil of the Haqqani network’s kidnapping of a pilgrim and his heavily pregnant wife engaged in helping ordinary villagers in Taliban-controlled regions of Afghanistan was eclipsed only by the stupidity and evil of authorizing the murder of my infant daughter, Martyr Boyle, as retaliation for my repeated refusal to accept an offer that the criminal miscreants of the Haqqani network had made to me,” Boyle said. He did not elaborate on the nature of the offer.

Boyle said he wants justice for the murder of his infant girl and rape of his wife, but that the grueling captivity would not stop his family’s resolve to “do the right thing, no matter the cost.”

The couple and their children were rescued Wednesday by the Pakistan army, ending their forced imprisonment by the terrorist network.

He said the family faces a long road back to recovery from their ordeal, but that “God-willing” the healing of body and soul will start soon.