The Afghan Taliban has published a biography of their new leader as hundreds of insurgents meet to resolve a dispute over his appointment following the death of reclusive head Mullah Mohammad Omar.
The detailed biography, emailed Monday to journalists in five languages, offers the story of Mullah Akhtar Mansoor, who now leads the Taliban in its fight against the Afghan government and foreign forces.
Mansoor was named as the Taliban’s leader last month after the Afghan government revealed that Mullah Omar died in 2013. But family of Mullah Omar objected, saying the vote to elect Mansoor was not representative of the group, sparking an internal power struggle.
Hundreds of Taliban fighters, including battlefield commanders, are meeting in undisclosed place of Afghanistan in an effort to resolve the leadership dispute.
Mansoor actively participated in various military operations against the former Soviet occupying forces and their internal stooges. In 1987, during a direct assault on a strategic Russian military post in Sanzary area of Panjwai district in Kandahar, he was injured with thirteen wounds on his body. He was injured for a second time in May 1997 at Mazar-i-Sharif airport during the reign of the Islamic Emirate (of Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001) and subsequently captured by the opponent forces.
In 1994 when the Islamic Movement of Taliban was founded by (Mullah Omar), (Mansoor) played a crucial role in the organisation and development of this movement. Due to his Jihadi and administrative proficiencies, he was tasked major responsibilities by the then head of the Islamic Movement of Taliban. When Kandahar province fell to the Taliban, he was given the responsibility of air force and air defence system ofKandahar. While heading the aviation and tourism ministry of Afghanistan, he completed a number of new and reconstruction projects.
Besides being a member of the supreme leading council of Islamic Emirate, he was given the additional responsibility of jihadi in-charge ofKandahar province by (Omar). (Mansoor’s) jihadi ingenuity saw him take charge in drawing and managing jihadi plans for the entire south-western zone of Afghanistan after due consultations with the jihadi in-charges of neighboring provinces, carrying out successful fatal attacks against the invading crusaders in Kandahar as well as in Uruzgan, Zabul and Helmand provinces.
It was the year 2010 which would prove to be the most fatal and costly year for foreign crusading forces inside Afghanistan. Mujahidin managed to carry out their most fatal campaign against the enemy during the span of that year, forcing them to confess to the deaths of 770 foreign soldiers. (Under Mansoor), Mujahidin managed to liberate vast areas of our beloved homeland from the enemy and establish an organised Islamic system of life in them.
He speaks less and tries to listen more to other people. He likes and wears loose, neat and clean clothes. He dislikes and avoids extravagance and prodigality in dressing, eating and all other needs of everyday life.
