Taliban denies cracks in ranks of new Afghan leadership

Mr. Baradar, who heads the Taliban’s political office in Doha, Qatar, and signed the February 2020 Doha Agreement on the Withdrawal of US Troops, at a Sunday meeting between the Taliban leadership and Qatar’s Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al- did not attend. Then I

Sheikh Mohammed’s visit was the first and so far the only public ministerial visit to Kabul since the Taliban captured the Afghan capital on 15 August and announced the restoration of their Islamic emirate, ousting the Afghan republic established after the 2001 US invasion. Was.

Mr Baradar, a relative moderate, was flown back to Afghanistan last month by a Qatari military plane, and his absence from the meeting with Sheikh Mohammed fueled social media speculation about conflict within the Taliban.

Residents of Kabul spread rumors about an alleged shooting between Mr. Baradar and leaders of the Haqqani family at Rashtrapati Bhavan, another power center within the Islamic movement. It didn’t help that it had taken days for Mr Baradar to appear on the video.

“The media talking about controversies between us is completely wrong. We are more kind to each other than family members,” he said while sitting on a green sofa in an interview on Afghan State TV aired on Thursday.

The interviewer and Mr Baradar, who had earlier said in an audio release that he was traveling out of Kabul, both read his written questions and answers from sheets of paper.

“I didn’t know that Qatar’s foreign minister was visiting Afghanistan. If I had known, I would have delayed or canceled my visit,” Mr. Baradar said in the TV interview. “We assure all Afghans that they should not worry at all.”

Western officials said Mr Baradar was upset with the structure of the new Taliban government, which was introduced on 7 September. Mr Baradar’s office did not include any other politicians in the new administration, relying on promises made during peace talks in Doha. Army or Technocrat.

The powerful Interior Ministry went to the Haqqani network leader Sirajuddin Haqqani, who is wanted by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation for his alleged role in the killing of an American citizen in the 2008 attack on the Kabul Serena Hotel.

Some foreign officials said Mr Baradar, with all of his contacts in Doha, may have been out of information about the Qatari foreign minister’s visit to Kabul, much to the detriment of his dwindling role within the Taliban.

In Mr. Baradar’s absence, Mr. Haqqani called on the UN Special Representative for Afghanistan, Deborah Lyon, on Wednesday. According to a UN release, he stressed the need for all UN and humanitarian personnel to be able to work in the country without fear and hindrance. On Thursday, he met with Abdulhaq Wasiq, the intelligence chief of the Taliban government.

Sirajuddin Haqqani’s brother Anas Haqqani, in a meeting with some foreign journalists at the Serena Hotel on Thursday, dismissed reports of a rift between Haqqani and Mr. Baradar as malicious speculation on social media by agents of the former regime.

“The hype grew to such a level that even close friends became suspicious,” Mr Haqqani said. “I swear to God that there is nothing like this between us. Disputes over power are impossible in the Emirate. The system is not built on personality but on trust.”