PESHAWAR: The Afghan Taliban on Tuesday formally announced that Maulvi Jalaluddin Haqqani, a former Afghan Mujahideen commander and founder of the Haqqani network, had died. Some Taliban sources, however, maintained he had died a few years back but his death was kept secret due to various reasons.
Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid and Haqqani family sources said Jalaluddin Haqqani had developed multiple health complications, including chest and jaundice that proved fatal. Sources close to the Haqqani family said he died on Monday and was laid to rest in a secret place in Afghanistan. According to sources, he was 80-plus.
Jalaluddin Haqqani is stated to be the first Afghan Taliban commander who picked up arms after the fall of the Taliban regime in 2001 and launched armed resistance against the US-led forces. The first attack was reportedly made in Matta Cheena area of Afghanistan's eastern Khost province. Jalaluddin Haqqani later approached other members of the dismantled Taliban regime and organised them under the leadership of Mulla Mohammad Omar to formally launch their armed struggle against the US-led Nato forces in Afghanistan.
According to sources, he came under several attacks from the US fighter jets and unmanned aircraft but narrowly escaped, especially in four missile strikes in a week soon after the fall of the Taliban government in Afghanistan. He was born in the small Sultankhel village of Garda Sarai district of Paktia province. He belonged to the Zadran tribe of Pakhtuns.
Jalaluddin Haqqani was a cleric-cum-tribal elder and had big influence in the area. He started his Jihadi journey from the Hezb-e-Islami Afghanistan. In the 1970s when the party split into two factions led respectively by Maulvi Yunas Khalis and Engineer Gulbaddin Hikmatyar, Jalaluddin Haqqani sided with the former. He later gathered strength and played a key role in the Afghan Jihad against the Soviet forces in the Loya Paktia, which included Paktia, Paktika and Khost provinces.
Among his contemporary Mujahideen leaders, Jalaluddin Haqqani was considered close to the CIA and ISI due to his effectiveness as a commander and their enormous financial and material support contributed to the might of Haqqanis, who primarily came together to fight the Soviet occupying forces.
Interestingly, some media organisations had reported that Jalaluddin Haqqani was so close to the CIA that the-then US President Ronald Reagan invited him to the White House where they addressed a joint press conference. Sections of the national and international media even released a photograph claiming that Jalaluddin Haqqani was seated next to Reagan. It was not true. The elderly person in the picture with henna-dyed beard was in fact Maulvi Yunas Khalis and not Jalaluddin Haqqani, who according to sources never travelled to the US or met President Reagan.
In the 1990s when Afghanistan plunged into a civil war and all former Mujahideen fighters fought for the control of Kabul, Jalaluddin Haqqani led his fighters to capture Khost from the communist regime of Dr Najibullah in 1991. Later when the Taliban came into power, he was appointed the governor of Khost province and later as minister of tribal affairs and frontiers.
Jalaluddin Haqqani brought his extended family to Pakistan and settled in the North Waziristan tribal region following the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. He went underground like other Taliban leaders after the fall of Taliban regime.
Though he was called the founder of the Haqqani network by the western media, Taliban sources claimed he never raised a separate faction and remained part of the Taliban led by Mulla Omar. People close to him argued that since he first started armed struggle against the foreign forces in Afghanistan, he came to be known as the founder of his group.
Senior US officials have blamed the Haqqani network for majority of US troops' casualties in the 17-year-long Afghan war. Due to his age and poor health, he transferred command to his second eldest son Sirajuddin Haqqani, also known as Khalifa among his fellow fighters. His son, however, proved more dangerous than his father and caused enormous losses to the foreign troops and the Afghan government by using the influence of his ailing father.
In one of his interviews with this reporter, Sirajuddin Haqqani had proudly recalled how he dared and risked his and his family's lives by reorganising the Taliban fighters to wage 'jehad' against the invading forces in Afghanistan. He said when they picked up the gun against foreign forces, most senior Taliban leaders were no longer willing to be called Taliban as the United States through media propaganda had over-awed its opponents.
Sirajuddin Haqqani recalled he had to sell jewelery of his family's women members for buying weapons and other material for launching the armed struggle in the early days of armed resistance against the foreigners. He claimed they had received several offers from the US and Hamid Karzai regime in the past to give up fighting in return for important positions in the government.
Jalaluddin Haqqani had two wives, one an Arab woman from the UAE, from whom he had three sons and two daughters. According to sources, his Arab wife later shifted to the UAE along with her children and settled there. His Arab connection reportedly enabled Jalaluddin Haqqani to develop contacts with the rich Arab Sheikhs and receive support for the war effort in Afghanistan.
The Haqqani family is said to have given enormous sacrifices, more than other Mujahideen leaders, first against the Soviets and later the US-led Nato forces. From his Afghan wife, he had eight sons and three daughters. Four of his sons -- 17-year-old Omar Haqqani, Mohammad Haqqani, 22, Badruddin Haqqani and Naseeruddin Haqqani, have already been killed.
Omar was killed in a firefight with the US-led forces at Satto Kandao in Khost in 2008, Mohammad Haqqani and Badruddin Haqqani, stated to be an operational commander of the Haqqani network, were killed in the US drone attacks in North Waziristan, in 2009 and in August 2013, respectively, while Naseeruddin Haqqani was gunned down by unknown men in Islamabad.
Another of his sons Anas Haqqani was captured by the US and Afghan security agencies while flying from Qatar via Bahrain. He is now in custody in Afghanistan.
In 2009, the United States announced $5 million head-money on Sirajuddin Haqqani. It had also announced reward for the capture of his two brothers Naseeruddin Haqqani and Badruddin Haqqani.
The Haqqani network has been blamed for an assassination attempt on President Karzai and suicide attack on Indian embassy in Kabul. It had allegedly helped a Jordanian national, Dr Humam Khalil Abu Mulal al-Balawi, to attack the CIA camp in Khost to kill seven CIA agents in 2010.
Except for the Kabul Serena Hotel, the Haqqani network did not claim the credit for other major attacks in the Afghan capital.