Risk of Al-Qaeda's revival rising as US, NATO troops withdraw from Afghanistan: UN report

As the US and North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) wind down their military presence in Afghanistan, a United Nations (UN) report released last week said that the risks of an Al-Qaeda revival are rising. As per the report, the Taliban operatives consisting of Afghan, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, and Myanmar nationals now run Al-Qaeda's Indian sub-continent chapter from Kandahar, Helmand, and Nimruz provinces in Afghanistan.

The UN report informed the Al-Qaeda Indian chapter's leader is Osama Mahmood, who recently succeeded the late Asim Umar.
Umar's wife was among 5,000 Taliban prisoners freed by the Afghan government in 2020 as part of the Doha agreement with the United States, which facilitated the US troop withdrawal.

"The group is such an 'organic' or essential part of the insurgency that it would be difficult, if not impossible, to separate it from its Taliban allies," the report said.

The UN Analytical Support and Sanction Monitoring Team listed the Haqqani network, the terrorist group that has used asymmetric warfare to battle US-led NATO forces, as the main link between Al-Qaeda and the Taliban, reported Asia Times. It added that Al-Qaeda and the Haqqani network are closely interlinked on "ideological alignment, common struggle, and intermarriage."

As per an ANI report, the Haqqani network, which has been blamed for several high-profile suicide attacks in Afghanistan, also has the backing of elements within the Pakistani security establishment. Washington deemed the group a terrorist organization in 2012 and repeatedly called on Pakistani authorities to launch military operations against the group.

Al-Qaeda Chief Al-Zawahiri likely to be near Afghan-Pakistan border: UN

Prominent Al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahri and other important leaders of the militant group reside in Afghanistan and Pakistan border region, stated another United Nations report last week. The report, issued on Friday, said that Zawahiri is “probably alive but too frail to be featured in propaganda.” It also said that significant numbers of Al-Qaeda fighters along with other foreign extremist elements that align with the Taliban are housed in various parts of Afghanistan. 

(With ANI Inputs)