The leadership transition in Taliban and its impacts on current situation

The Taliban leader, Mullah Akhtar Mansour had been killed by a US drone strike in the border region between Afghanistan and Pakistan on May 21, 2016.

The news about the death of Taliban leader, Mullah Mansour was first released by the US Department of Defense, saying that the US President Barrack Obama had ordered the attack because Mansour was a major obstacle in the way of peace in Afghanistan. The death of the Taliban leader was later confirmed by the Afghan Presidential Office, Afghan Chief Executive Office, Afghan Ministry of Interior and National Directorate of Security.

Four days later, the Taliban issued a statement and confirmed the death of Mullah Mansour and in the meanwhile announced the new leader of the Taliban. The statement says that the Deputy of Mullah Mansour, Mawlavi Hibbatullah Akhundzada was appointed as the new leader of the group and Serajuddin Haqani and the former Taliban leader, Mullah Omar’s son, Mawlavi Mohammad Yaqub was appointed as his deputies.

The impacts of Mullah Mansour’s death on the Taliban group, the consequences of the change in Taliban leadership and the new leader’s stance on the Afghan peace process are the issues that are analyzed here.

 

Mansour’s journey from Taliban’s deputy to leadership

Since 2001 and after reorganization of the Taliban, the Taliban leaders were repeatedly detained, imprisoned or killed. In 2007 the second senior Taliban figure, and Mullah Omar’s deputy Mullah Obaidullah Akhund was detained in Pakistan and died in prison in 2010; it is yet to be cleared whether he died of natural reasons or was killed by Pakistan.

When Obaidullah Akhund was detained, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar was appointed as the Taliban deputy and Mullah Akhtar Mansour was appointed Baradar’s deputy. Following Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar’s detention in 2009, Mullah Mansour was appointed as the Taliban deputy and was in charge of Taliban’s organizing affairs. After Mullah Mohammad Omar’s death in 2013, Mansour was a de facto leader of Taliban (although according to a source close to the Taliban, Mullah Omar had put him in charge of the Taliban’s organizing and military affairs way back in 2010). But Omar’s death was kept secret till July 2015 and after face to face talks with the Taliban in Murree Omar’s death was disclosed. The Taliban confirmed Omar’s death several days after its disclosure and appointed Mullah Akhtar Mansour as his successor. After the appointment of Mullah Mansour disputes began in the ranks of the Taliban; but few months before the death of Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Mansour disputes among the Taliban were reduced and later Mullah Zaker and Mullah Omar’s family (Mullah Yaqub and Mullah Abdul Mannan) and Mullah Hassan Rahmani also supported him.

 

The former Taliban leader’s peace policy

Since Mullah Akhtar Mansour’s appointment as the Taliban deputy till he became the Taliban leader, the group experienced many ups and downs. In this period progresses were made in the field of peace in which the role that Mullah Mansour had played was pretty apparent.

In his term, the Afghan Taliban inaugurated their political office in Qatar and began negotiation with the countries in the world. The office played role in releasing some prisoners, participated to Peace conferences in other countries and expressed their positions to the world. Besides that, the first direct talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban was held during Mansour’s leadership, but was unfortunately sabotaged after the disclosure of the death of Mullah Mohammad Omar.

Some districts in the Northern Afghanistan fell at the hands of the Taliban during Mansour’s leadership and the most important event was the collapse of Kunduz (the sixth major city of Afghanistan) on September 29, 2015 which was under the Taliban control for two weeks.

Although he did not show green light to peace efforts of the Afghan government during his ten months leadership; but according to a source close to the Taliban, he was inclined to peace talks; but he did not wanted peace talks under the conditions that the Afghan government had put forward.

Although in official statements after the death of Mullah Omar it is said that Mansour was a major obstacle on the way to peace; but there are some analysis saying that he died because of his closed relation with Russia and the probability of initiation of direct talks after the Afghan President’s recent visit to Qatar.

The Afghan Taliban have also indicated in their statement that Mansour was targeted due to non-participation in “imposed and fraud processes” it indicates the QCG meetings.

 

Taliban’s new leadership

Although killing Mullah Mansour was a major blow for the Taliban; because he was in charge of organizing and military affairs of the Taliban and a great part of the Afghan Taliban’s strategy (about peace and war) was being conducted by him; but still the afghan Taliban has twenty years of history and since 2001, some other similar events have also occurred where the Taliban leaders were either killed or had left the Taliban ranks; but yet it has never had any significant impact on the group in military fields.

The new Taliban leader Mullah Hibbatullah was the head of military court during the Taliban regime, and after the collapse of the Taliban, he was the Chief Justice of the group and since last year he was deputy to the former Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mansour.

Overall, it does not seem that any revolutionary change has come to the Taliban leadership because the new leader and Serajuddin Haqani were deputies of Mullah Akhtar Mansour and recently Mullah Yaqub had also been included in the leadership council of the Taliban by Mullah Akhtar Mansour.

 

The future of peace

The new leadership of the Taliban is formed of characters that were close to Mullah Mansour. The followings are the reasons behind the appointment of these three figures as the Taliban leaders:

• Mullah Hibatullah is an afghan religious scholar
• Serajuddin Haqani plays significant role in the battlefield
• And the announcement of Mullah Yaqub as deputy was an effort to unite the Taliban under the new leadership

Although the new Taliban leader has not released any voice message or statement about his peace and war strategy but still since Mullah Hibatullah and Serajuddin Haqani were deputies of Mansour, their strategies in these fields will not be changed. Besides that it does not seem that any large group of the Taliban would split from them.

The parties of the Afghan war have now realized that war is not the solution of the Afghan issue and the current war will also end through negotiations, and since a great portion of foreign forces have left the country; instead of pressurizing the Taliban through other countries, if the Afghan government conducts peace efforts through an Afghan impartial mediator, the Taliban may join the negotiations.

The end