Hardliner new Taliban leader, deputies may oppose peace talks

PESHAWAR: Was it a coincidence or prior planning that on Wednesday a vehicle carrying judges and other court employees was attacked by a Taliban suicide bomber near Kabul on the day Shaikh Haibatullah Akhundzada, a former judge, was appointed as the new leader of the Afghan Taliban movement?

Whatever the case, the attack in Paghman district near Kabul showed the intent of the Taliban to continue the fight. It also showed that judges too would not be spared even if they are in the same profession as the new Taliban head. They are on the opposite side of the Afghan divide and judges in particular are a target because some of them have sentenced captured Taliban fighters to death. There have been 11 attacks to date against the judges, attorneys and other court employees. 

Taliban played safe instead of experimenting with a new leader to succeed Mulla Akhtar Mohammad Mansoor, who was killed in a US drone strike in Balochistan’s Naushki district on May 21. To avoid any succession battle, the Taliban Rahbari Shura (leadership council) promoted Haibatullah Akhundzada, one of the two deputy heads of the armed movement, to become their supreme leader.

The deputy leader’s post that fell vacant after his elevation as the head of the movement was filled by Mulla Mohammad Yaqoob, the young son of late Taliban founder Mulla Mohammad Omar. It appears that Yaqoob, in his early 20s, is being groomed to eventually become the leader of the Taliban. The other deputy leader, Sirajuddin Haqqani, head of the Haqqani network, has been retained in his position. Both Yaqoob and Haqqani are primarily handling Taliban military operations. 

Haibatullah Akhundzada, who is in his mid-50s and belongs to the Registan district in Kandahar province and the Noorzai Durrani tribe, has his weak and strong points. He doesn’t belong to any prominent family and hasn’t served as Taliban military commander or politician. However, he is a religious scholar and served as the chief judge in the “Nizami Mahkama” or the military courts that heard complaints and allegations made against the Taliban fighters and gave verdict based on Shariah. 

The new Taliban leader and his two deputies are hardliners and are expected to continue the inflexible Taliban policies of late Mulla Omar and his successor Mulla Akhtar Mansoor. Haibatullah Akhundzada is a foremost proponent of Shariah and strict in implementing Islamic teachings and punishments. Like his late leader Mulla Akhtar Mansoor, he is expected to reject peace talks with the Afghan government, more so after Mansoor’s assassination by the US in the drone attack. 

The new Taliban leader courted controversy on his very first day in office. The dissident Taliban faction led by Mulla Mohammad Rasool, who is in custody of Pakistani authorities, refused to accept Haibatullah Akhundzada as the Ameer and disputed the way he was chosen by a small number of Rahbari Shura members.

Aides to Mulla Rasool told The News that the same mistake committed last July at the time of Mulla Akhtar Mansoor’s hasty appointment as the Taliban head by the Rahbari Shura was repeated and a chance to unify the Taliban factions was missed. They argued that wider consultation should have taken place by inviting 10 Taliban military commanders and 10 leading clerics from every one of the 34 Afghan provinces to appoint a more acceptable and credible figure as the Taliban head.

They also questioned Haibatullah Akhundzada’s credentials by pointing out that he was neither a fighter nor controlled any fighters and also didn’t have martyrs in his family. However, the dissidents termed Yaqoob’s appointment as a deputy leader a good decision and said he should have been made the head of the Taliban movement to make use of his popularity to unify the Taliban. 

Another controversy that haunted the new Taliban leader on the first day was the release of a hard-hitting statement attributed to him. The Taliban spokesmen moved quickly to issue a denial that Haibatullah Akhundzada hasn’t issued the statement. The audio statement in Pashto attributed to him said that no talks would be held with the Afghan government and the fight against it and the foreign forces in Afghanistan would continue. The statement also criticised former mujahideen leader Gulbaddin Hekmatyar for making a peace agreement with the Afghan government.

—Originally published in The News