Taliban confirms Mullah Omar’s death, succession

“He is known among fighters in the field as more into peace talks than Mullah Omar, and less strict”, said one Taliban commander who asked to stay anonymous.

The confirmation of Omar’s death ends years of fevered speculation about the fate of the leader, who has not been seen in public since the 2001 US-led invasion of Afghanistan that toppled the Taliban from power. They also provide an opening to rival Islamic State (IS), the Middle East-based extremist movement that has attracted renegade Taliban commanders in both Afghanistan and Pakistan. With such a positive myth built around him, Mullah Omar was the glue that held the fractious Taliban together. “So this is a completely new situation”, said Bette Dam, author of an upcoming biography of the Taliban leader. The contradictory reports about his death come a day after the Taliban confirmed its founder Mullah Omar had died some time ago.

“It is clear that his demise, after decades of war and thousands of lives lost, represents a chance for yet more progress on the path to a stable, secure Afghanistan”, the White House said in a statement.

The statement did not mention the succession.

However, a third member of the family said the reports were true.

In an email to journalists, Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said Omar had “abandoned this mortal world” as the result of an illness. Omar’s direct role in day-to-day Taliban operations had been declining for years, according to western diplomats in Afghanistan.

Afghanistan later said the meeting scheduled in Pakistan had been postponed, voicing hope that it would be convened in the “near future”. Omar’s 26-year-old son, Yaqoob, and other hardliners oppose the peace talks, according to a recent story by a veteran Pakistani journalist with close ties to the Taliban.

Mansour’s appointment is unlikely to please everyone in the Taliban. Key area commanders have criticised the peace course of and vowed to battle for energy, slightly than negotiate it. “And so keeping that quiet was doable, given the fact that he was largely secretive about his movements as communications for years”.

Taliban captured a district in the southern province of Helmand that foreign troops struggled to secure for years. Zakir said. He assured Taliban fighters that he would continue to serve the Emirate-e-Islami, a name officially used by Afghan Taliban for their movement.

But American forces refused to believe that the commanders had given up fighting, and after a series of aggressive night raids he fled to Pakistan, where he helped reshape the Taliban as an insurgent force.

This month, two Afghan militant groups swore allegiance to Islamic State, and more could follow suit.

The founder of the Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorist group, which carried out the 2008 Mumbai attack that killed 166 people, tweeted from his official account saying “funeral prayer in absentia is being offered of amir (chief) of hundreds and thousands of Mujahideen”.