Amir Khan Muttaqi امیر خان متقی | |
---|---|
Minister of Foreign Affairs | |
Acting | |
Assumed office 7 September 2021 | |
Prime Minister | Hasan Akhund (acting) |
Deputy | Sher Mohammad Abbas Stanikzai (acting) |
Supreme Leader | Hibatullah Akhundzada |
Preceded by | Haneef Atmar |
Member of the Leadership Council | |
Assumed office 15 August 2021 | |
In exile May 2002 [1] – 15 August 2021 | |
Minister of Education and Minister of Information and Culture | |
In office c. 1996 – c. 2001 | |
Leader | Mullah Omar |
Succeeded by | Noorullah Munir (2021) |
Personal details | |
Born | Nad-e-Ali,Helmand, Kingdom of Afghanistan | 26 February 1971
Occupation | Politician, Taliban member |
Political affiliation | Taliban |
Amir Khan Muttaqi ( Pashto: امیر خان متقی [ˈamɪr xɑn mʊtaˈqi]; born 26 February 1971) is an Afghan Taliban politician serving as acting Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan since 7 September 2021. [2] He was also a member of the negotiation team in the Qatar office. [3]
Khan was born on 26 February 1971 in a village of the Helmand Province, his family's roots being in the Paktia Province, getting his primary education in a local school and mosque but because of the communist Saur Revolution, he had to move with his family to neighboring Pakistan, where he was enrolled in a refugees’ madrasa and studied subjects such as Arabic grammar, logic, rhetoric, jurisprudence, hadith and Qur’anic exegesis. [4]
He continued his higher Islamic studies at the Darul Uloom Haqqania, a seminary in Pakistan's Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province from which many other influential Talibans graduated. [5]
He was initially part of Maulvi Mohammad Nabi Mohammadi's group during the Afghan jihad but later joined the Taliban movement when it emerged. [6]
Khan served as Minister of Information and Culture and as a representative of the 1996–2001 Taliban government in United Nations-led talks. [7] [8] During that time, a pro-Taliban source says that his "innovative activities" led to "a systematic jihadist publication apparatus against the enemy’s widespread media aggression." [9]
On 17 August 2021, just after the fall of Kabul to the Taliban, he was reported to be in Kabul talking to non-Taliban politicians such as Abdullah Abdullah and Hamid Karzai about forming a government. [10] Taliban forces took control of Afghanistan's capital city of Kabul on 15 August 2021 during a military offensive against the Afghan government that had begun in May 2021.[ citation needed]
On 7 September 2021, the Taliban announced the first members of a new "acting" government, three weeks after coming to full power with the takeover of Kabul on 15 August. Amir Khan Muttaqi was appointed as Afghanistan's acting foreign minister. [2]
In December 2021, Amir Khan Muttaqi attended a session of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation Council of foreign ministers as Afghanistan delegate. [11] The session were attended by delegations from 57 nations with China, Russia, and United States of America as guest delegations. [12] Amir Khan discussed with Pakistan prime minister, Imran Khan, regarding the threat of ISIS in the Afghanistan-Pakistan border region. [13]
In 2004 he wrote a book which was banned by the Taliban leadership, which thought some of its information could not be aired publicly. [14] [15]