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| Saturday, 26 April 2003 |
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Taliban leaders wanted in Kabul are Mullah Omar's allies ISLAMABAD, Friday (AFP) A gang of four Taliban commanders named by Afghan leaders as possibly hiding out in Pakistan were top allies of the militia's leader Mullah Omar, diplomats and Taliban experts say. Afghan President Hamid Karzai named the men during a two-day state visit to Pakistan that was dominated by Kabul's quest for more help in apprehending top Taliban believed to have regrouped in Pakistan. He cited Akhtar Mohammad Usmani, a confidante of Mullah Omar, the Taliban's one-legged former intelligence chief Mullah Dadullah, its top military commander and internal security chief Mullah Biradar as well as its former Kandahar intelligence chief Hazfiz Mujeeb. Karzai requested help in hunting the men along their ill-defined 2,450 kilometer (1,519 mile) border during the talks, a Pakistani official told AFP. A string of attacks in Afghanistan in recent months is widely believed to have been masterminded by former Taliban commanders including the four on the most wanted list. All four were mujahedin fighters against Soviet troops occupying Afghanistan from 1979 to 1989 and held key military positions under the Taliban's 1996-2001 regime. Usmani, former commander of Taliban forces in the southern province Kandahar, was the only person to have full access to Omar and is believed to have influenced his thoughts and actions. "He was very, very close to Mullah Omar. The United States wants him desperately," writer and expert on Taliban affairs, Rahimullah Yousafzai, told AFP. Dadullah, a dreaded one-legged commander, was notorious for torturing prisoners. He mainly led Taliban operations in northern Afghanistan against rival Tajik, Uzbek and Hazara ethnic groups. He escaped northern Kunduz province during the US-led bombing in late 2001 by bribing local Uzbek commanders from the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance, an official said. Biradar was one of the five founders of the Taliban movement. He became its military commander and chief of intelligence. Mujeeb is credited with organising the first attacks against US forces around the south-east Afghan town of Spin Boldak, which borders Pakistan, a diplomat said. |
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