Canadian Dave Lavery recounts his 77 days as a prisoner of the Taliban – National

Canadian Airborne Regiment and former United Nations Security Advisor, Dave Lavery, has been traveling in and out of Kabul for two decades.

Since the Taliban returned to power in 2021, he also helped to evacuate hundreds of Afghans vulnerable to reprisals due to their work for the military of Canada.

But while the Taliban had not disturbed him in the past, when he landed at Hamid Karzai airport on the morning of November 11, 2024, they seemed to wait for him.

They placed it in police custody and held it for 77 days until it finally let it go on January 26. “It was scary, it was intimidating,” he told Global News on Sunday.

In an interview one week after his release, Lavery said the Taliban had questioned him several times to find out if he was a spy. His kidnappers were also suspects because he was carrying 18 visas and plane tickets for two Afghan families eliminated to come to Canada.

The beret and the combat jacket in his bag were also held against him, he said, even if they were simply to wear when he posted a day crown during a memorial for Canadian soldiers .

“I am a spy, that kind of thing,” he said, describing the allegations that the Taliban’s general management of information put him during interrogations.

He said he still didn’t know that the agreements, if necessary, had been concluded by the Canadian government or the Qatari intermediaries who negotiated his release. “This is the question for a million dollars,” he said.

Foreign Minister Mélanie Joly announced the liberation of Lavery last Sunday and thanked the Prime Minister of Qatar, Mohammed Bin Abdulrahman Al Thani.

Since then, Lavery had refrained from making public statements, but after a week of freedom, he spoke to Global News since his home in Dubai, joined by his wife, Junping.

He also shared a newspaper he held during his captivity. It starts with his name, Birthdate, a note to his family and a wish to “never give in” and ends with the entrance, “go home”.

Lavery has a long record for international humanitarian service. After two decades in the Canadian army, he went to work for the United Nations as a security advisor in 2000.

Canadian Dave, as he is known, responded to the crises of the world, Sudan and Somalia in Pakistan and Sri Lanka, working with United Nations and NGOs.

He visited Afghanistan for the first time in 2005, when an airplane crashed in the mountains outside Kabul, an experience which led him to move to the city in 2010 as a private private entrepreneur .

Thanks to his company Raven Rae Resources Group, he continued in the same niche he had occupied in the UN – until the American forces began their disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021.

While Islamist activists advanced on Kabul, the Afghans who had helped the Canadian army and government were desperate to escape, fearing the revenge of the Taliban.

In collaboration with Veterans Transition Network, a British Columbia Beds-based Biverse Organization, he brought them to safe houses and stayed while the Afghans assailed the airport, trying to obtain flights ‘evacuation.

He helped hundreds to get into the planes before jumping on one of the last himself, and his new base in Dubai, continued to help Afghans flee, using vehicle convoys to escort them and their families in Pakistan.

Meanwhile, following the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, he launched an operation in Poland who evacuated the Ukrainians who had worked with the Canadian forces.

“Dave Lavery is a Canadian hero,” said Gavin Dew, who chairs the VTN, who is based in Vancouver and was created in 2012 to provide advice and trauma programs to veterans.

The day before his departure for Kabul, Lavery posed for a photo on the beach of Dubai, holding a copy of the book he was reading: Escape Kabul.

The next morning, wearing a marine jacket with a red poppy on the reverse, he took a selfie on the bus at Dubai airport and sent him to his colleagues.

He was the first of the plane in Kabul. He cleaned customs and obtained his baggage carousel suitcase, but he soon suspected that he was followed.

He said that he had left the terminal and went to the parking lot to meet Junping, who was already in Kabul, when security officials caught him.

They brought her back inside the airport and crossed his bags, finding plane tickets and Canadian government visas.

The Taliban also looked bad at that of the beret and the combat jacket he had brought to honor the day of Canada.

Hesks blindfolded and with a scarf binding his hands, he was put at the back of a vehicle and taken to a cell, starting what he calls his “illegal detention”.

When Lavery did not leave Kabul airport, Junping waited and tried to call, but his phone was extinguished. He also did not respond to WhatsApp messages.

She showed her photo and phoned Lavery’s son, but it was quickly apparent that the worst had happened: the Taliban had taken her prisoner.

Remembering his military training, Lavery said that he had tried to stay calm and understand his environment.

His interrogator explained that if he cooperated, an investigation could officially begin, but if he did not do so, they would come back in a month and were trying again.

It could last for years, said the Taliban intelligence manager, and Lavery had spent enough time in Afghanistan to know that it is true.

Its cell was four meters by six meters, with a narrow window sealed with reinforcement bars. A mattress was lying on a stained red carpet and there was a plastic cup for the cellar.

Lavery said he was saying that it could be his house for a long time, and that what would be less than it would be a bonus. He entered a walking routine around his cell.

Hoping to go to the hospital, where he could be able to be talked about, he started playing the role of a frail old man, walking with a soft and complaining of kidney disorders and a replacement of the hip.

The Taliban responded in a mocking way. They had seen his online profile, who described him as the Canadian Dave. The Canadian Dave did not need a doctor, they said, the Canadian Dave was strong.

“What’s wrong, Canadian Dave?”

Following a meal made up of a fish head, he started vomiting and called to be taken to the hospital for tests, which they did.

He was then blinded and taken to a “guest house” complex where four Americans were also detained (two were quickly released in an exchange of prisoners).

It was a step in place of his cell, and there was a television where he could watch CNN.

The interrogations he crossed were threatening, he said. The Taliban accused her of spying and checked his body for a GPS tracker.

He was asked about the Canadian Security Intelligence and Israel, and what he was doing in Ukraine. He replied that he was not a spy. But, he said, he was not beaten or tortured.

At the end of December, the Taliban moved it again, this time at the villa which served as the basis of Lavery in Kabul. He was under house arrest but had a certain comfort of the house.

He was authorized to call his family for the first time on December 30. But he then found a Nokia phone that his kidnappers had missed.

Once he got his hands on a cable, he was able to load him and call his son Brant, who was shocked to hear his father’s voice.

Brant said in an interview that he had reassured his father that the Qatar government was monitoring it and worked to get it out.

Canadian officials were also in touch with the Qataris and thought that his release was imminent.

“And I was able to nourish part of this type of information to Dad,” said Brant in an interview. “I think that has increased its morale.”

The family had an additional incitement to see Lavery released as quickly as possible. Brant and his wife are waiting for their first child in the spring, and they wanted him there.

“Believe me, I pushed the Canada World Affairs and everyone I could. I called and I had telephone calls with Minister Joly, “said Brant.

“This is something we really wanted. We pushed for that. In our calls with Minister Joly, she said she would work very hard on this subject. »»

On January 25, Lavery worked on the roof of the villa, eaten a pizza dinner and wrote a note in his newspaper in Junping before a guard came to his room.

“Good news David”, according to the story of the conversation in his newspaper. “You are released – 100% tomorrow, you will go.”

The Taliban told him that the courts of the country had decided that he had been cooperative and had served enough time, although for what was never explained.

“Good night see you tomorrow”, reads one of his last newspaper entries. “Wow, I’m going home on day 77. I was very lucky.”

When his plane landed on Doha, he went down the air staircases and saw a row of civil servants on the Tarmac. He thought that a VIP had to be on the plane.

But they were there for him. He posed for photos with the Qataris and found Junping and his son before returning to Dubai.

Lavery said he was “very, very satisfied” in Canada World Affairs, and said Joly was “fantastic” and gave his son his son so that they could speak.

He does not intend to return to Kabul, he said.

The Qataris told the family that it was the fastest case they had ever dealt with. Afghan families Lavery went to help were also safely evacuated to Pakistan by road.

Brant said the family was delighted that Lavery was there at the birth of her grandson.

“We can celebrate something really positive for the whole family. And we know that Dad will be there with us, ”said Brant.

“Many things worked behind the scenes, and Canada was a large part and the Qataris.”

“We really have to thank so many people.”

Stewart.bell@globalnews.ca