Mullah Baradar, co-founder of Taliban returns to Afghanistan after 20 years

The Taliban co-founder and Deputy leader, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, has returned to Afghanistan after 20 years. This was confirmed by a spokesman for the Taliban group. His return is coming 11 years after he was arrested in Pakistan. Baradar and his brother-in-law, Mohammad Omar, founded the Taliban movement after the Russians were driven out […]

The Taliban co-founder and Deputy leader, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, has returned to Afghanistan after 20 years. This was confirmed by a spokesman for the Taliban group.

His return is coming 11 years after he was arrested in Pakistan.

Baradar and his brother-in-law, Mohammad Omar, founded the Taliban movement after the Russians were driven out in 1989 and there was a civil war between rival warlords. The main aim of the movement was for the religious purification of the country and the creation of an emirate.

In a statement, Its spokesman said the Taliban would grant a “blanket amnesty” for all in Afghanistan, including members of the Afghan military and interpreters.

“We don’t want Afghanistan to be a battlefield,” Zabihullah Mujahid told a Tuesday press conference in Kabul.

“Today the fighting is over….whoever was against the opposition has been given blanket amnesty. The fighting should not be repeated.”

“Those families who are in the airport in fear right now, they should be returning… I assure them in their lifetime no one will be going to them and asking them what they have done and not done,” he added.

The group’s deputy leader Maulvi Mohammad Yaqub also told fighters not to “enter into homes of people or confiscate their cars”