![]() Fifty or so Afghan resistance groups were consolidated by the ISI into a smaller, more manageable number,” writes C. Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq continued with this policy after he ousted Bhutto in a July 1977 coup. “In August 1973, Bhutto set up the Afghan working group within Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) directorate. With Mohammad Doud emerging as an assertive Afghan leader, former Pakistani Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto earnestly began his Afghanistan project. In fact, since 1950, Afghanistan had launched incursions into Pakistan’s Baluchistan province-an effort that flared into the 1970s. The debacle in Bangladesh activated fears about a similar fate along the Durand line. Pakistan’s involvement in running an Afghan extremist group can be traced to the 1971 war when Pakistan lost nearly half of its population and a sizable chunk of resources with the formation of Bangladesh. ![]() ![]() Ashley Jackson, co-director of Overseas Development. The HQN enjoys the support of the Pakistani military and the ISI-the main bone of contention between Pakistan and the US. There are at least six ministers in the newly formed Taliban government who are directly associated with the most dreaded UN designated terror organisation in Afghanistan.Īccording to experts, the Haqqanis are “war profiteers” who have a strong financial interest in the continuation of conflict, since this creates the conditions which allow them to run criminal activities from extortion to kidnapping to drug trafficking to money laundering, alongside legal activities in business sectors, including import-export, transport, real estate and construction in Afghanistan, Pakistan, the Gulf and beyond. Sirajuddin Haqqani’s uncle Khalil Haqqani, who has a $ 5 million bounty, is also in the cabinet. It was ISI chief’s Faiz Hameed’s visit to Kabul last week, which gave the Haqqanis a lion’s share in the Taliban’s cabinet. However, the power behind the Haqqani throne is the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), Pakistan’s powerful spy agency. In exchange for Frerichs the Haqqanis are seeking the release of Afghan drug lord Bashir Noorzai who is in American prison. In fact, the CIA chief had met Mullah Baradar last month after the Taliban’s takeover of Kabul for the release of the last American contractor Mark Frerichs who is under the “custody” of the Haqqani Network. Khalifa, as Sirajuddin is known in his HQN group, is a serial hostage taker who is currently holding American contractor and former war veteran Mark Frerichs in Afghanistan right now. As India Narrative reported earlier, his description on the FBI website states that he has been known by at least 15 aliases and was thought to live in Pakistan while also maintaining close links with the Taliban and al-Qaeda through his own Haqqani network.Īlso Read: Haqqani empire feeding on extortion, kidnapping, drug trafficking and real estate steers Taliban government in Afghanistan Haqqani’s power is symbolised by Sirajuddin Haqqani still holds a bounty of $10 million on his head for his indulgence in terrorism and much more. In fact, as Akhund raised the Taliban flag, a robust rebellion was raging in the Panjshir valley, the ground-zero of the Afghanistan’s ethnic Tajik minority, with a powerful history of armed resistance. Unfortunately, the dominance of the criminal Haqqani empire at the centre of the new so-called “caretaker” government leaves little room for optimism about the formation of an inclusive government, which represents Afghanistan’s non-Pashtun minorities. The new government got into work mode after the Taliban over-ran Afghanistan, and the capital, Kabul on August 15.Īfghanistan’s first president to follow the 2001 collapse of the Taliban, Hamid Karzai, tweeted with a call for “peace and stability,” hoping that the new caretaker Cabinet would mutate into an “inclusive government that can be the real face of the whole Afghanistan.” He pointed out that the flag-raising marked the official start of the work of the new government. Mohammad Hassan Akhund, the prime minister of the Taliban interim government hoisted the flag on in a low-key ceremony, AP reported citing Ahmadullah Muttaqi, multimedia branch chief of the Taliban’s cultural commission. The Associated Press is reporting that the Taliban raised its white flag over the Afghani presidential palace Saturday-a day when the US and the world marked the 20th anniversary of the September 11 terror attacks on the twin-towers in New York. The Haqqani empire which is at the core of the new Pakistan-backed Taliban regime in Kabul has mocked the United States by choosing 9/11 as the date of launching its new government in Afghanistan. People commemorate September 11 attacks (Photo: IANS)
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