“Afghan Interior Minister Ali Ahmad Jalali has said that international terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden and Taliban leader Mullah Omar are hiding in the north-western province of Pakistan. ‘They are most likely hiding in Pakistan’s north-western province bordering Afghanistan,’ Jalali told RIA Novosti news agency at the end of his three-day visit to Moscow.”
Jalali explained that “this is a mountainous area inhabited mainly by the Pushtu, which enjoys a great deal of autonomy and independence in domestic affairs. These mountains are harbouring many of the al-Qaeda supporters and Talibans,” he said.
These mountains aren’t empty: they’re full of radical mujahedin. “The Afghan people have got tired of war. It is, therefore, not surprising that Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, a leader of the extremist Pushtu Islamic party of Afghanistan, who had until recently been in exile in Iran, has declared jihad against the Karzai government and the USA, but found no support among Afghans,” Jalali pointed out.
I hope they don’t. But the Taliban is still quite active, and there are numerous indications that jihad ideology is far from dead in Afghanistan.