KEY FIGURES OF 12 THE WARS IN IRAQ AND AFGHANISTAN the Soviet forces led to their departure a decade later In the void civil war reigned with the Islamist fighters known as the mujahideen battling first to oust the Soviet backed government and then turning their guns on each other In 1996 the Taliban seized Kabul and instituted a severe interpretation of Islamic law that for exam ple forbade female education and prescribed the severing of hands or even execution as punishment for petty crimes That same year al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden was welcomed to Afghanistan having been expelled from Sudan and established his organization's headquarters there With al Qaeda s help the Taliban had won control of over 90 per cent of Afghan territory by the summer of 2001 On September 9 of that year al Qaeda hit men carried out the assassination of famed mujahideen leader Ahmad Shah Massoud who at the time was leading the Northern Alliance a loose coalition of mujahi deen militias that maintained control of a small section of northern Afghanistan as it battled the Taliban and who had unsuccessfully sought greater U S backing for his efforts THE U S BRITISH IN VASION After the September 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States for which bin Laden was considered the architect the United States demanded that
WAR IN AFGHANISTAN 13 THE TALIBAN After a bloody decade long war in Afghanistan a group intent on establishing a new society based on Islamic law came to power in the mid 1990s The group was known as the Taliban Most of the faction's members were former students of religious training institutes set up in the 1980s for Afghan refugees in northern Pakistan In addition to enforcing strict Islamic law known as Shari ah the Taliban allowed Afghan istan to be a haven for Islamic militants from throughout the world including an exiled Saudi Arabian Osama bin Laden who stood accused of organizing numerous terrorist attacks against U S interests The Taliban's refusal to extradite bin Laden to the United States following the ter rorist attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon outside Washing ton D C on Sept 11 2001 prompted a military confrontation with the United States and allied powers The U S led forces began aerial attacks on Afghanistan on Oct 7 2001 and U S special forces were later deployed on the ground With U S backing the Northern Alliance an Afghan opposition force that had controlled a small portion of the country in the north advanced southward on the ground The Taliban surren dered Kandahar its political and religious base on December 7 Taliban control of Afghanistan officially ended on Dec 9 2001 after the regime gave up the province of Zabul its last remaining territory Bin Laden was eventually killed in a raid by U S forces in Pakistan in 2011
KEY FIGURES OF 14 THE WARS IN IRAQ AND AFGHANISTAN Before the Taliban regime collapsed some al Qaeda terrorists took refuge in remote caves such as this one in Afghanistan s Tora Bora
WAR IN AFGHANISTAN 15 FAUL Afghanistan turn over bin Laden to U S authorities threatening military action for noncompli ance The Taliban refused despite escalating pressure and in October of that year the United States aided by British forces began an air assault on key mil itary targets in Afghanistan The two countries provided significant logistical support to Northern Alliance forces in an attempt to force the regime to yield to its demands Within a month the Taliban regime began to crum ble and UN led peacekeeping talks began with members of the Northern Alliance On Decem ber 7 the Taliban surrendered Kandahar the militia's base of power and the last city under its control In early December with the Taliban defeated Pashtun tribal leader Hamid Karzai was appointed by a UN led coalition to head an interim government In 2002 a transitional govern ment was selected to rule the country until national elections could be held and a new consti tution
