There have been reports of divisions among the Taliban leadership, raising questions about the unity within the group which took over the country last month.
The public’s doubts about the group’s unity only increased earlier this month, when Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the deputy prime minister, seemed to have disappeared from public view. Then came reports that he had been killed.
When he did reappear, it was with a pre-recorded statement. Baradar, clearly reading from some sort of a statement, said his fading from the public eye was the result of travel, and that the Taliban, “have compassion among ourselves, more than a family”.
In a final bid to ease suspicions about his death or injury, Baradar was photographed attending a meeting with United Nations officials on Monday. However, diplomatic and political sources have told Al Jazeera that the discord among the Taliban leadership is very real, adding that if the disharmony grows, it will spell further trouble for the Afghan people.
A writer and reporter who has spent several years covering the Taliban said the divisions are the result of a political-military divide. The hardliners, he said, “feel that they are owed things for 20 years of fighting”.
Awaiting the spoils of war
A political source who has had a decades-long relationship with the Taliban’s top brass agrees. He says the effects of that rift extend from the halls of power to the streets, where the Taliban fighters have been going through major cities and forcefully taking the belongings of former officials and their families.
“Right now, all they care about is taking people’s cars and houses.”
Families of former officials have told Al Jazeera that Taliban fighters have tried to seize their belongings, including homes they rented and their private cars.
This is despite the deputy minister of information and culture, Zabihullah Mujahid, saying two days after the Taliban took over the country that “we have instructed everyone not to enter anybody’s house, whether they’re civilians or military”. At that same August 17 media briefing, Mujahid went on to say, “There’s a huge difference between us and the previous government.”
However, to those familiar with the situation, the current Taliban leadership is facing many of the same issues with factions as the government of former President Ashraf Ghani, who fled the country the day the Taliban took Kabul.
Sources speaking to Al Jazeera said as with other Afghan governments, the divisions among the Taliban fall along personality lines. But unlike previous administrations, the Taliban does not just suffer from overly ambitious members or opposing political views, its split is much more fundamental.
Currently, the Taliban, said the sources, is made up of fighters still awaiting the spoils of war versus politicians who want to assuage the fears of the Afghan people and the international community. Courtesy: Al-Jazeera
