Kabul: The Taliban has placed former Afghan President Hamid Karzai under house arrest in Kabul. There are reports that Abdullah Abdullah, former Foreign Minister of Afghanistan and Chairman of the National Reconciliation Council, has also been imprisoned in his house. The Taliban has also removed the security of these two senior Afghan leaders. Both these leaders were also involved in talks with the Taliban to form a government. Russian news agency Sputnik quoted CNN as saying that the Taliban have also confiscated the cars of these two leaders. In such a situation, Hamid Karzai and Abdullah Abdullah are completely at the mercy of the Taliban at this time. According to CNN, the Taliban searched Abdullah Abdullah’s house on Wednesday.
Earlier this week, the Taliban inducted Karzai, Abdullah, and Taliban co-founder Abdul Ghani Baradar into its 12-member council governing Afghanistan. The Taliban are in the process of forming a new government after taking control of the capital Kabul as well as nearly all other provinces in the country on 15 August. It is not yet clear why the Taliban have placed these two senior leaders under house arrest. Both these leaders had a close relationship with the Taliban for a long time. Then the Taliban had captured Kabul, even then these two leaders had negotiated reconciliation with them. In such a situation, many questions are also being raised on the detention of Hamid Karzai and Abdullah Abdullah.
The three most powerful men in the leadership council will be Taliban co-founder Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, Mullah Mohammad Yacoub, son of Taliban founder Mullah Omar, and Khalil Haqqani, the most senior member of the Haqqani network. All three will be the biggest face of the government of Afghanistan. Even if one or two of these three are not included in the government, they will still work behind the scenes to run the government.
