BREAKING: Taliban’s Mullah Baradar To Lead New Government In Afghanistan, Say Reports

Mullah Baradar, the head of theTaliban’s political office, will lead the new government in Afghanistan, at least three sources in the Islamist group said. 

Written by: India.com News Desk Edited by: Surabhi Shaurya

Updated: September 3, 2021, 1:44 PM IST

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Kabul: Two weeks after the fall of Kabul, Mullah Baradar, the head of the Taliban’s political office, will lead the new government in Afghanistan, at least three sources in the Islamist group confirmed this to the news agency Reuters. If sources are to be believed, Mullah Mohammad Yaqoob, the son of late Taliban founder Mullah Omar, and Sher Mohammad Abbas Stanekzai will be given senior positions in the government.

Taliban co-founder Mullah Baradar will lead a new Afghan government set to be announced shortly, sources in the Islamist group said on Friday, as it battled rebel fighters in the Panjshir Valley and strived to ward off economic collapse: Reuters

— ANI (@ANI) September 3, 2021

Earlier on Thursday, Anamullah Samangani, from the Taliban’s cultural commission had said that Mullah Hebatullah Akhundzada will be the leader of the new government.

• Abdul Ghani Baradar, popularly known as Mullah Baradar, was brought up in Kandahar, considered as the birthplace of the Taliban movement.
• In 2010, Baradar was arrested near Pakistan’s Karachi. He was kept in custody until 2018, after which he was relocated to Qatar.
• After the release, Baradar was appointed as the chief of the Taliban’s diplomatic office in Doha.
• He also oversaw the signing of the US withdrawal agreement of seeking complete removal of US forces from Afghanistan.
• It is believed that he fought side-by-side with the one-eyed cleric Mullah Omar during the Soviet-Afghan War in the 1980s.
• During Taliban’s collapse in 2001, after the September attacks in the US, Baradar is said to be among a small group of insurgents who approached interim leader Hamid Karzai with a letter outlining a potential deal that would have seen the militants recognise the new administration.

Role of women in offices still unclear

While reports claimed that the government will be announced shortly in the strife-torn nation after the Taliban takeover, the role of women in government offices is still unclear. Taliban said that women will not be appointed in higher ranking positions despite, TOLO News reported citing one of the group’s officials.