In the meanwhile, Afghan Taliban Movement key commander Mullah Abdul Qayum Zakir has rejected reports of differences with newly appointed chief Taliban Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Mansoor and pledged to continue his services for the movement.
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Bette Dam, author of an upcoming biography of Mullah Omar, said the supreme leader’s absence paralyzed many Taliban officials. “It’s not clear if Mullah Omar had much, if any, influence left at the time of his death, and many believe he’d been reduced to a symbolic figurehead”, wrote correspondent Tom A. Peter.
A Taliban official said that after the group’s ruling council had chosen a successor for Omar, the decision was supposed to be ratified by a college of religious clerics.
Jamaat-ud-Dawa chief and 26/11 Mumbai attacks mastermind Hafiz Saeed led a “funeral” prayer for Taliban’s longtime supremo Mullah Omar here after the terror outfit confirmed his death. He fled to Pakistan shortly after the US invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.
He has lent his support to the ongoing peace talks with the Afghan government, but due to the ongoing rift amongst the leadership the second round of talks to be held on Friday 31 July have been postponed indefinitely. Qatar Taliban, which funds most of the splinter groups has already expressed its displeasure in negotiating with the Ashraf Ghani government.
Mansour, who was named the new Amir-ul-Momineen?- “commander of the faithful” -? faces staunch internal resistance from some members of the Taliban’s ruling council, the Quetta Shura, who accuse Pakistan of hijacking the movement.
The ISI had long been accused by Afghanistan of protecting Mullah Omar, with former President Hamid Karzai making precisely that claim in a 2006 interview with the Associated Press. READ ALSO: Afghanistan investigating reports of Taliban leader’s death Mansour will be only the second leader the Taliban have had since Omar, an elusive figure rarely seen in public who founded the ultra-conservative Islamist movement in the 1990s.
Afghan officials are saying Omar’s death, even if it’s not particularly recent, proves the need for peace talks, though the timing seems awkward since it would undercut Omar’s own endorsement of the process.
The image of Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Mansoor was provided by a senior Taliban figure on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to release it. Its authenticity could not be independently verified by NBC News. There is also up to a $10 million bounty for Sirajuddin Haqqani. NATO’s combat troops pulled out of the country at the end of last year, leaving Afghan forces in charge of security.
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Abdul Wadood Wahidi, spokesman for the Kunduz governor, said the militants had planted explosives beneath the bridge connecting Qala-i-Zal and Chahar Dara districts.
