Fahim Dashty and General Zara killed

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Afghan Resistance Leader Says Ready For Negotiations To End Panjshir Fighting

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Massoud

By RFE/RL’s Radio Azadi
September 5, 2021

The leader of Afghanistan’s resistance front against the Taliban said on September 5 that he welcomed proposals by religious scholars for a negotiated settlement to end the fighting in the Panjshir Valley, the last holdout against Taliban control in Afghanistan, as resistance fighters and the militants both claimed gains.

Ahmad Masud, head of the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan (NRFA), made the announcement on the group’s Facebook page amid reports of heavy clashes in the Panjshir Valley.

“To reach a lasting peace, the [NRFA] is ready to stop fighting on condition that the Taliban also stop their attacks and military movements on Panjshir and Andarab,” Masud said, referring to a district in the neighboring province of Baghlan.

Earlier, Afghan media outlets reported that religious scholars had called on the Taliban to accept a negotiated settlement to end the fighting in Panjshir, located about 100 kilometers northeast of Kabul.

There was no immediate reaction from the Taliban.

The fighting came as U.S. General Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned about a “broader civil war” in Afghanistan as he questioned whether the Taliban could consolidate power as its shifts from an insurgency to governing.

Taliban spokesman Bilal Karimi said earlier on September 5 that its forces had fought their way into Bazarak, the capital of Panjshir, and had captured large quantities of weapons and ammunition.

The opposition, called the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan, claimed it had trapped Taliban fighters in the valley and repelled militant offensives in several districts.

It was not immediately possible to get independent confirmation of events in Panjshir, where the Taliban has cut off phone, Internet, and electricity lines.

Emergency, an Italian aid group that operates a hospital in the valley, said on Twitter late on September 4 that the Taliban had reached the village of Anabah, located around 25 kilometers north inside the 115-kilometer-long valley.

Former Afghan Vice President Amrullah Saleh, a leader of the National Resistance Front, acknowledged earlier in a video message that the front’s forces were in a difficult situation, but he vowed to continue resisting.

“We are under attack from Al-Qaeda, terrorists, the Taliban, and Pakistan’s supporters. But we are defending our country,” Saleh said.

“The resistance continues. The enemy has suffered casualties. We also have suffered casualties. I attended the funeral of one of my companions. But the situation is under our control,” he said in the recording, according to TOLOnews.

Since the Taliban seized Kabul on August 15, the militants have faced resistance from the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan, which groups opposition forces loyal to local leader Ahmad Masud, who said on Facebook that Panjshir “continues to stand strongly.”

The continued fighting has prompted warnings about the possibility of civil war.

Although both sides have held some meetings to resolve the issue peacefully, the talks failed to bear any fruit.

“I think there’s at least a very good probability of a broader civil war,” said Milley, in a bleak assessment.

“I don’t know if the Taliban is going to be able to consolidate power and establish governance,” Milley said, speaking at Ramstein Air Base in Germany.

Milley said if it cannot do that, it will “in turn lead to a reconstitution of Al-Qaeda or a growth of [Islamic State] or other myriad of terrorist groups” over the next three years, referring to Islamic State-Khorasan (IS-K) militants in Afghanistan.

Meanwhile, Atta Mohammad Noor, the head of the Jamiat-e Islami party that has ties to the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan, warned that the continuation of the Taliban’s attack on Panjshir will lead to another war in the country.

“If the leaders’ request for a political agreement does not bear any results, the expansion of the resistance front is one of the other options that we will concentrate on,” Noor said on September 4, according to TOLOnews.

With reporting by Reuters and TOLOnews

Copyright (c) 2021. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave NW, Ste 400, Washington DC 20036.

Under siege from Taliban, Amrullah Saleh writes from Panjshir

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The situation in the Panjshir valley remains tense and there have been heavy casualties on both sides. In a dispatch from the frontlines, the former Vice President of Afghanistan and the so-called caretaker president of the country Amrullah Saleh has written a moving personal account on the overall situation.

Taliban cut off the communication lines to Panjshir valley

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Battle in Panjshir has intensified. The Taliban is inching closer to taking over the Panjshir valley. Five out of seven districts have fallen to the Taliban control.

How Are the Taliban Organized?

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Mullah Baradar with ISI Chief Faiz Hameed

Abdul Sayed
VOA News
September 5, 2021

After two decades of near-constant warfare and destruction, the Taliban now face the need to figure out how to govern the underdeveloped and impoverished nation they have just recaptured. Some insight into how that may progress can be gleaned from a closer look at the group’s leadership and organizational structure, as well as the parallel shadow government they established to prepare themselves for the challenges ahead.

The reestablishment of the Taliban leadership council after 9/11 

As quickly as the Taliban seized power in recent weeks, their defeat at the hands of an international coalition and allied Afghan forces in 2001 was just as swift. The U.S.-led invasion destroyed the Taliban’s organizational command and scattered their leadership. Their fighters merged into the populace or fled with refugees to neighboring Pakistan. According to a book written by a Taliban senior member, Abdul Hai Mutmain, in 2016, it was not until May 2002 that their supreme leader, Mullah Muhammad Omar, was able to gather a few senior aides and set up a leadership council to direct resistance against the United States and its allies.

The members of that council comprised Mullah Akhtar Muhammad Usmani, Mullah Abdul Lateef Mansur, Mullah Akhtar Muhammad Mansur, Mullah Dadullah Khund, Mullah Jalaluddin Haqqani, Mullah Abdul Kabeer, Mullah Hamdullah Nani, Mullah Muhammad Hassan Rahmani, Mashar Mullah Muhammad Hassan Akhund, and Mullah Ameer Khan Mutaqi. Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar and Mullah Obaidullah Akhund were appointed its first and second emirs. The leadership council serves much like a government Cabinet running all the group’s affairs subject to the approval of the supreme leader.

Obaidullah Akhund was arrested by Pakistani intelligence agencies in February 2007 and was succeeded by Akhtar Muhammad Mansur as a deputy to Mullah Baradar. Pakistani intelligence arrested Baradar three years later, and Mansur succeeded him both as deputy supreme leader and head of the leadership council.

After the Taliban announced Mullah Omar’s death in 2015, Mansur became the Taliban supreme leader and appointed two deputies — Shaikh Hibatullah Akhundzada, the Taliban current emir, and Mullah Sirajuddin Haqqani — head of the Haqqani network.

After Mansur died in a U.S. drone strike in May 2016 in Pakistan, Shaikh Akhundzada succeeded him and appointed Mullah Yaqoob Omari, son of its founding emir, Mullah Umar — to serve as a deputy alongside Haqqani. When Baradar was released from a Pakistani prison in 2018, Akhundzada made him a third deputy with responsibility for political affairs. This leadership structure remains in place, with Shaikh Hibatullah Akhundzada serving as supreme leader, aided by the three deputies — Mulawi Yaqoob Umari, Shaikh Sirajuddin Haqqani and Mulawi Abdul Ghani Baradar.

The Taliban bureaucracy 

Muhammad Ahsas, a well-informed authority on the Taliban, told VOA that the Taliban have divided Afghanistan’s 34 provinces administratively into two branches, south and southeast. The south comprises 14 provinces and falls under the authority of Umari. The southeast comprises the remaining 20 provinces and is administered by Haqqani. Each province is divided into eight zones, which in turn are divided into districts similar to those that already exist. Mutmain writes in his book that the Taliban appointed its shadow provincial and district governors in 2005.

According to Ahsas, the Taliban leadership has established 18 commissions which function like ministries, dealing with military, political, economic, media and culture, public works, intelligence, and other matters. Eleven of these commissions are categorized as large and seven as small. Each has representatives at the zonal, provincial and district levels.

The Taliban-appointed governor for Kunar, Haji Usman Turabi, announced to a large public gathering last month that these commissions were now responsible for running the province. Citizens were told they should contact the appropriate commission to ask for any service they might need.

According to Mutmain, the first three Taliban commissions were military, economic, and cultural, established in 2004.

Afghan researcher Fazelminallah Qazizai says that the biggest and most significant Taliban commission is its military commission. The Taliban deputy chief, Mullah Yaqoob Umari, heads that commission with three deputies — Maulawi Sadar Ibrahim, Maulawi Abul Qayum Zakir, and Qari Fasihuddin. All three are prominent military commanders. Fasihuddin is the senior commander for nine northern provinces and is of Tajik ethnicity.

Qazizai says the next most important commission is the economic commission which, like the military commission, deals with drug smuggling, a significant source of income for the Taliban. The intelligence commission is smaller but also considered to be significant. It deals with drone technology and other modern weaponry.

According to Ahsas, the media and culture commission lacks the big budget of the intelligence commission or the vast organizational structure of the military commission but is also considered vital. The political commission, meanwhile, is the most prominent currently, due to its daily interaction with the international media. It operates under Baradar and has several senior leaders including Mohammad Abbas Stanekzai, Suhail Shaheen and Shaikh Shahabuddin Dalawar.

Qazizai says the 18 commission heads serve on the Taliban leadership council along with several other senior military commanders and prominent religious scholars. According to a confidential Taliban source, the leadership council currently has around 30 members, although most meetings are attended by only 18 to 20 of them, mainly the commission heads.

Qazizai says the most influential Taliban figure after the supreme leader is Shaikh Abdul Hakeem, a religious scholar who has served as a teacher and mentor to all Taliban leaders since the group’s founding in 1994 — including Mullah Omar, his son Yaqoob and his successor Akhtar Muhammad Mansur. Hakeem designs the Taliban’s most important religious verdicts, which drive its policies. He also drafted the Taliban verdict against the Afghan affiliate of the Islamic State group or Daesh. His seminary in the Kuchlak area of Pakistan’s Baluchistan province was targeted by a suicide attack in January 2020. Hakeem survived but lost a son. There were several other casualties as well.

Also wielding influence is a group of powerful special forces commanders, known as the Sara Qitaa, or Red Unit. This group has battalions across the country and became prominent in the Taliban’s largely successful fight against Daesh. Its most prominent commanders include Peer Agha, the Taliban current governor for Kunar, Haji Usman Turabi, Bilal Fatih Zadran in Paktika, Umar Yasir in Laghman and its two recently killed commanders — Naik Muhammad Rahbar from Nangarhar and Abu Idrees Yousaf from Ghazni. Rahbar played an instrumental role in driving Daesh from its strongholds in Nangarhar before the group assassinated him in April.

Several other important military figures are still playing central roles on the ground but have been kept away from the international media. Among these is Bilal Zadran, who emerged from the Haqqani network and is considered a top commander despite his low public profile in the last couple of years.

Abdul Sayed is a security specialist and researcher on radical militant groups in Afghanistan and Pakistan based in Lund, Sweden.  Twitter: @abdsayedd

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Hibatullah Akhundzada is expected to be the Emir

Taliban Accused Of Killing Pregnant Female Police Officer

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Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
September 5, 2021

Taliban militants have been accused of killing a female police officer in the province of Ghor in central Afghanistan.

The woman was shot dead at the family home in front of relatives in Firozkoh, the capital of Ghor Province, her family told the BBC, saying that she was eight months pregnant.

Hassan Hakimi, a civil society activist from the province who resides abroad, told the German dpa news agency that the woman was killed in front of her husband and son.

“We were concerned about women who used to work for the police, at the safe house, and at the women’s affairs directorate,” Hakimi said, adding that “the Taliban has warned them many times.”

The Taliban denied any involvement in the killing.

Since taking back power after the fall of Kabul last month, Taliban leaders have said they would respect the rights of women within the framework of Islamic law.

But incidents of repression against women are being reported in the country.

During their 1996-2001 rule, also guided by Islamic Shari’a law, the Taliban stopped women from working. Girls were not allowed to go to school and women had to wear all-enveloping burqas to go out and then only when accompanied by a male relative.

Afghan women have held several protests for the past two days in Kabul and Herat, advocating for women’s rights and demanding equality, justice, and democracy.

On September 4, the Taliban forcibly broke up a demonstration by dozens of women in Kabul demanding equal rights.

Based on reporting by the BBC and dpa

Copyright (c) 2021. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave NW, Ste 400, Washington DC 20036.

Top US general warns of civil war in Afghanistan amid clashes between Taliban and opposition

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Mark Milley

Press TV
September 5, 2021

A top US general has warned of a “civil war” in Afghanistan amid clashes between the Taliban and opposition forces in the Panjshir Valley north of Kabul.

The two groups battled on Saturday to control Panjshir which has been the only region to hold out against the Taliban following their takeover of Afghanistan.

The Taliban, which swept through the war-torn country ahead of the final withdrawal of US troops on August 31, could not control the valley when they ruled Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001.

Ahmad Masoud, the son of the late anti-Soviet Mujahideen commander Ahmad Shah Masoud, has established himself in Panjshir Valley, leading a several-thousand-strong force comprised of militias and remnants of the Afghan army and special forces units who are opposed to the Taliban.

Masoud has called for a negotiated settlement with the Taliban but has said his forces will resist if the narrow and mountainous valley is attacked.

Speaking to Fox News on Saturday, US Gen. Mark Milley, chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said, “My military estimate is, is that the conditions are likely to develop of a civil war. I don’t know if the Taliban is going to be able to consolidate power and establish governance.”

His remarks come as both sides claimed to have the upper hand in Panjshir but neither could produce conclusive evidence to prove it.

Nearly 600 Taliban fighters were killed in Panjshir, the resistance forces’ spokesperson Fahim Dashti tweeted, according to Sputnik News.

He also said the Taliban had problems with getting supplies from other Afghan provinces.

“About 600 Taliban terrorists have been liquidated in various districts of Panjshir since morning. More than 1,000 Taliban militants have been captured or surrendered themselves,” Dashti said.

Also, in a Facebook post, Massoud insisted Panjshir “continues to stand strongly.”

However, Emergency, an Italian medical aid organization, said Taliban forces had pushed further into the Panjshir Valley on Friday night, reaching the village of Anabah where the group has medical facilities.

“We have received a small number of wounded people at the Anabah Surgical Centre,” Emergency said in a statement, noting that many people fled in recent days.

Milley underscored the tenuous situation there, saying “I think there’s at least a very good probability of a broader civil war and that will then in turn lead to conditions that could, in fact, lead to a reconstitution of al-Qaeda or a growth of ISIS (Daesh) or other myriad of terrorist groups.”

The Taliban are poised to run Afghanistan again 20 years after they were removed from power by American invading forces.

The group took control of Afghanistan on August 15, forcing the US-allied Afghan president, Ashraf Ghani, to flee the country.

Taliban Claim Fresh Advances Against Afghan Opposition

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Ayaz Gul
VOA News
September 4, 2021

ISLAMABAD – The Taliban claimed Saturday that their forces had seized several districts in the northern Panjshir Valley, the last remaining province in Afghanistan holding out against the Islamist group.

Taliban officials said that overnight advances had brought several days of fighting to Anaba, an area close to the provincial capital, Bazarak.

Emergency, an Italy-based charity, confirmed the Taliban had reached Anaba. The nongovernmental organization, which runs a medical center in the area, said its facility had “received a small number of wounded people.”

The Taliban also released a video showing light mountain artillery guns and other weapons they said had been seized from the armed resistance.

The veracity of the footage could not be ascertained from independent sources.

Taliban officials blamed land mines placed on the road to Bazarak for their slow advances.

For its part, the opposition National Resistance Front (NRF) said Saturday that it had pushed back “enemy” attacks but acknowledged losing ground to the Taliban and said both sides had suffered casualties.

“Enemy was defeated in the Dalansang area,” tweeted Fahim Dashty, a spokesman for the NRF. “Experienced and new heroes of the resistance forces have been present on the frontline.”

The Panjshir Valley, home to the country’s Tajik ethnic minority and located north of the capital, Kabul, is surrounded by mountain peaks.

Afghanistan has 34 provinces and 33 of them were overrun by the Taliban last month in a stunningly swift military campaign that ended with their seizure of Kabul on August 15.

The fighting for the control of Panjshir broke out several days ago and since then both sides have been making inflated claims and counterclaims about their battlefield gains.

The anti-Taliban armed resistance comprises members of the U.S.-trained former Afghan security force and local tribal militias. It is being led by Ahmad Massoud. His father successfully defended Panjshir when the Taliban took control of most of Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001.

Massoud vowed in a Facebook post Saturday to resist and “stand strongly in the fight” against the Taliban.

The lack of control over all of Afghanistan has apparently discouraged the Taliban from announcing a new government.

On Saturday, small groups of female activists took to the streets in Kabul and in parts of western Afghanistan, demanding respect for their rights and representation in the new government.

Taliban fighters broke up a rally of about a dozen women in the capital to stop them from heading to the presidential palace.

Footage circulating on social media showed demonstrators confronted by armed Taliban fighters covering their mouths and coughing, with one woman saying the security guards had used tear gas to disperse the rally.

“They also hit women on the head with gun magazines, and the women became bloody,” said one of the demonstrators who identified herself as Soraya.

“Taliban blocking protest by beatings and tear gas: unfortunately this is pretty much on brand for a group that relies on brute force to suppress dissent,” tweeted Patria Gossman, associate Asia director for Human Rights Watch.

The Taliban imposed a brutal justice system and banned women from work and prevented older girls from receiving an education when the fundamentalist group had previously seized power in Afghanistan.

However, Taliban leaders have promised to install an inclusive government in Kabul that they say will allow women to work and receive education within the framework of Islamic law, or Shariah, but many Afghans doubt the reliability of their pledges.

“It will be an inclusive, strong central and sustainable system of government,” Bilal Karimi, a Taliban spokesman, told VOA on Friday.

The Taliban are under international scrutiny for delivery on pledges that their governance system will represent all Afghan ethnic groups and respect human rights, particularly those of women, unlike their previous exclusive hardline regime in Kabul.

Some information for this report came from Reuters.

Related

Fighting Continues Between Taliban and Resistance Forces

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Tolo News: Although no details have been released about the ongoing fighting between the Taliban and resistance forces in Panjshir since Friday night, Taliban officials said they have captured four districts in the province. Due to the cutoff telecom services in Panjshir, TOLOnews was unable to obtain comments from the Resistance Front about the fighting. Click here to read more (external link).

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