Taliban announce death of Khazarian rebel leader Maulavi Mahdi in western Afghanistan

MADRID, 17 Ago. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The Taliban have reported this Wednesday the death of the Khazarian rebel commander, the Maulavi Mahdi, when he tried to enter Iran through the province of Herat, in western Afghanistan, according to the Ministry of Defense.

"Islamic Emirate forces killed the rebel leader of the Balhab district of Sar e Pol province, the Maulavi Mahdi, in the border region of Herat province, while he was trying to escape to Iran," the Taliban said without offering more. details about when the victim was killed.

The figure of Mahdi, who joined the Taliban thirteen years ago now in the midst of a foreign invasion of Afghanistan, was essential in defeating the precarious presence of the Afghan state in the north of the country. He was the only Khazarian commander who supported them against Ashraf Ghani's government.

However, ten months after the Taliban definitively assumed power after the swift capture of Kabul in August 2021, Maulavi Mahdi began his criticism of the fundamentalist group, unhappy that he did not find greater representation of the Hazara people in the government, he says. Jaama agency.

The non-participation of the ethnic minorities of Afghanistan in the new Taliban government is one of the main reproaches that the international community has launched against the regime, as well as the persecution of dissent and the demolition of the small advances that women achieved in terms of rights.

The Mahdi resistance in the Balhab district was already seriously hit in June. At the end of that month, the Taliban announced that they had managed to suppress that rebellion, after several days assaulting the positions in which he was mutinous along with his own.