Taliban elects new leader after Mullah Omar’s death

An Afghan with links to top Taliban leaders had approached Afghanistan’s intelligence service in the winter of 2014 with the “startling tip” that Mullah Omar had died in a hospital in Karachi, Pakistan.

The Afghan Taliban are praising their new leader, saying he was one of the most “trusted” associates of the late Mullah Mohammad Omar.

The announcement of Omar’s death threw into disarray a fledgling peace process fostered by neighboring Pakistan aimed at ending more than 13 years of war between the Taliban and the Western-backed government in Kabul. The acknowledgment did not give any details of when Mullah Omar died or from what illness.

The irony in all this self-righteousness on the part of Pakistani state structures is that the Taliban chose Mullah Omar’s successor on Pakistani soil within 24 hours of confirming their one-eyed leader’s death. Indeed, it is highly plausible that Pakistan conceded Mullah Omar’s death only because it could not deliver him or his incontrovertible message for the talks when Afghan government put pressure on Pakistan for it.

The White House on Friday urged the Taliban “to heed President Ghani’s call for reconciliation and make genuine peace with the Afghan government“.

Others said Kabul could also take control of a peace process that has been largely in the hands of the Pakistani authorities, widely believed to support the Afghan Taliban and to have pressured its leaders to deal with Ghani’s government, which has made peace a priority. “It will spark a leadership crisis that could get bloody, and it will distract the Taliban from focusing on the peace talks”. But beyond the fact of Mullah Omar’s death, the chatter appears to have revealed little else.

Later, addressing the JuD members, Saeed said Omar was “a great asset as he played an important role in the defeat of the United States and North Atlantic Treaty Organisation forces in Afghanistan”. Pakistan cited the reports of Omar’s death as the reason for delaying the talks, because of concerns that a battle for succession could further deepen discord between the Taliban’s numerous factions.

“Mullah Mansour is one of the founders of the Taliban movement and he is a moderate, pro-peace, pro-talks person”, said Abdul Hakim Mujahid, a former Taliban official and a member of the Afghan High Peace Council.

The confirmation of Omar’s death ends years of speculation about the fate of the leader, who was not seen in public since the 2001 US-led invasion of Afghanistan that toppled the Taliban from power.

Afghanistan later said the meeting scheduled in Pakistan had been postponed, voicing hope that it would be convened in the “near future”.

Siraj Haqqani, leader of the powerful Haqqani militant faction, will be a deputy to Mansour, both commanders added.

Political analyst Ahmad Saeedi said the Taliban’s statement could signal a total rejection of the talks.

“This will be the Afghan Taliban’s biggest test yet”, said Michael Kugelman, an Afghanistan expert at the Washington-based Woodrow Wilson worldwide Center for Scholars.

“Not for a single day in the last 14 years did he go to Pakistan or any other country and led the Islamic Emirate affairs from his headquarters”, the statement said, referring to the militant group by its official name and declaring three days of prayer ceremonies in his memory.