The Afghan Taliban have released a new picture of a young Mullah Omar, the only known image of the Taliban leader before he lost his right eye in battle.
The picture, taken in 1978, was first posted on the Taliban’s official site.
A senior Taliban official who sent AFP the picture confirmed that it was originally a black-and-white image andwas later colourised.
The life and death of Omar remain a mystery and the new image may be one of the only two verified photographs in existence.
The picture was taken while Omar was a student at a madrassa in Kandahar, according to the Taliban.
Born around 1960, Omer fought with the Afghan mujahideen against the occupying Soviet army in the 1980s and lost his right eye in battle, possibly to exploding shrapnel.
Taliban legend has it that he cut out the wounded eye himself, while more prosaic accounts say he was treated at a hospital in Pakistan.
