It was already approved at outline stage
Locked in a tiny cell in the desert, full of cockroaches with no bed or toilet for 190 days, and beaten to a pulp before his eventual freedom — this is how one Lincolnshire man managed to survive after being captured by the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Another term of the Doha Agreement saw more than 5,000 Taliban prisoners, including 400 accused or convicted of major crimes such as murder, released. His career moved towards private security in his mid-to-late 20s and 30s, where he worked in close quarters with some of the planet’s most important figures to keep them safe from conflict or any danger.
However, in the months leading up to the Taliban takeover of summer 2021, a number of senior members of the Afghanistan government reached out to Anthony in a bid to help them evacuate the nation safely. At worst, him going to Afghanistan would be a “wasted flight”, but he went to meet with four British nationals and was greeted with a meeting that had 74 nationals in just one meeting – of which there were multiple each day.
The former parachute regiment soldier moved over 400 families and children through checkpoints, and was quick to praise the “incredible” work of the British military out in Afghanistan. The lack of hostility left Anthony feeling relaxed, guards shake his hand at the headquarters and he hands in his phone as per protocol, before walking around to a side entrance into a holding cell – which formed part of the Taliban underground interrogation centre.Anthony said he was “not of interest” for around two weeks, as it turned out the Taliban had launched a surveillance operation against four other British nationals who were on the same street as him.
The prisoners were asked to hand over their mobile phone passcodes for evidence, which Anthony does not do given the nature of the information on his phone. One afternoon, Anthony was pinned down in his cell with his arms tied behind his back, as five uniformed Taliban members stood over him with weapons.
Officers then began slashing and whipping at his bare feet. Anthony counted the first 25 lashes but could not keep count after that, as another officer kicked him in the ribs with army boots on. Cockroaches crawled around in his 3x3m concrete underground cell, that had no bed and no toilet. The group were given three 10-minute toilet breaks a day, and despite the danger of the situation he was in, Anthony’s resilience and bravery never faltered.
He added: “Doctor Death came down and told us all we’d either be in the cell for 40 years or hung. In response to this, I asked him if he could order a pizza for me as I was starving. It was all about combatting their mind games. Weirdly, despite how notoriously evil he was, me and Doctor Death got along well.”
“We gave the guards nicknames of dementors while I read the Harry Potter books, and one guard ran away from me once because I was pretending to do spells with my toothbrush and he genuinely thought I was about to turn him into a frog!The power of loveA key player in this ordeal was Anthony’s fiancée Nicki Mortimer, a woman in her early 40s who dealt with the unthinkable task of unknowingly speaking to the Taliban officer who had been torturing the man she loves.
“I’d missed Christmas and Valentine’s Day at that point, and totally lost communication with her”, Anthony says. “It was a very emotional call but very brief, it was more of a proof of me being alive because everyone assumed we’d been killed at this point.” Nicki spoke directly with the Taliban during this time, and it later transpired that she had shared a phone conversation with Ahmed Zaheer, the very man alleged to have tortured her fiancé.
This eventually became his downfall, as the Haqani network, placed in charge of domestic security following the fall of Kabul, sanctioned that level of abuse and took action. Anthony quipped that he couldn’t read when asked to read a script into a camera – halting Ahmed’s plans at once. He was recognised at the English Veterans Awards following his ordeal. | Photo: Anthony Stephen Malone
He assured Anthony that he would be returning to the UK the next day, before passing him a bag of designer Italian clothes. “It felt like a windup”, he says. Since then, Anthony has been working directly with the Foreign Office and SO15 counter terrorism command to investigate the circumstances of his time as a hostage.
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