Former Afghan President Burhanuddin Rabbani was assassinated on Tuesday by a suicide bomber with explosives hidden in his turban, according to Kabul police officials.
Two confidential sources in the Afghan government said Rabbani, president of the Afghan government that preceded the Taliban, was killed in his home in Kabul.
Rabbani had been head of Afghanistan’s high peace council which aimed at a political settlement to the war, although little progress had been made in the year since it had been formed. Many Pashtun leaders called his appointment an insult and some Afghans saw him as a war criminal, instead of a peace broker, according to Nation reporter Jeremy Scahill.
In an interview at the time, the head of the reconciliation in Logar province said of the Rabbani appointment, “They’re creating conditions for a big fire they won’t be able to distinguish.”
After he was driven from Kabul in 1996, Rabbani became the nominal head of the US-supported Northern Alliance who replaced the Taliban in Kabul after the US had ousted them in 2001.
Rabbani’s death is the latest in a series of high-profile assassinations in Afghanistan, after the mayor of Kandahar Ghulam Haidar Hamidi and President Hamid Karzai’s half brother Wali Karzai. It is expected to further divide Afghanistan’s troubled political leadership.
Another collaborator bites the dust.
Yep. We're winning that one. Any day now…
“They’re creating conditions for a big fire they won’t be able to distinguish.”
I bet he said "extinguish"
"distinguish…… "extinguish" Doesn't matter!! "Distinguish" Can't recognize they won't be able to put it out.= Extinguish…. This is Afghanistan we are talking about… The people there are a lot like US… Honest until someone tries to rob or cheat them…. and this is ESPECIALLY true of OCCUPIERS…… Pashtun Wala is their default code of conduct… But to betray the locals to the occupier, well what happened to the collaborators.. in France AFTER the Nazis were driven out…??? P.S. They are waking these traitors while the Occupiers are STILL nominally in charge. Lets see, Karzai's Brother, the Governor of Kandahar..now Talabani…. Scary for all the traitors.. Representing the Foreign domination scheme… Can you hear me Joe Walsh…????? The tree of Liberty is getting watered in Afghanistan… Can you think of any other places where there is unacceptable foreign occupation or domination… which could lead to a big fire…. Bush mouthed the speech about fire in men's minds… " By our efforts, we have lit a fire as well – a fire in the minds of men. It warms those who feel its power, it burns those who fight its progress, and one day this untamed fire of freedom will reach the darkest corners of our world"……but it was ersatz….bogus… Not like the jackbooted oppression of occupation or empire the Afghans and the Palestinians must endure every day… Like the group of IDF members that BRAG about shooting pregnant women… and children………. "One Shot Two Kills" See: http://www.google.com/search?source=ig&hl=en&…
These are the signs of a real occupation with blatant dehumanization of their hapless, helpless victims!! Freedom is more than anything ELSE, freedom from foreign domination and unwanted rules, checkpoints…arrests and killings by those telling the local people what to do… Yes, Bush and Blare have ignited a fire in the minds of men….. But not quite the sort intended…
A long-earned reward. While Rabbani might not have been the most brutal warlord in the post-Soviet War civil conflict (any conflict that includes Gulbuddin Hekmatyar AND Abdurrashid Dostum sets a mighty high bar in that regard) there's no doubt that Rabbani's ambition and treachery set the stage for some of the most brutal phases of that civil war, including the siege of Kabul. He was as responsible as anyone for the fact that in the mid-90s many average Afghans came to the conclusion that the Taliban looked like a reasonable solution to their problems.
good point