Haibatullah Akhundzada, leader of the Taliban since 2016
Haibatullah Akhundzada.
- / AFP
The current leader of the Taliban is Mullah Haibatullah Akhundzada.
He has commanded the movement since May 2016 and bases its legitimacy on its credibility in religious matters.
At 60, this jurist could become the supreme religious authority in the new Islamic emirate of Afghanistan.
Originally from Kandahar province, birthplace of the movement, this discreet Pashtun fought the Soviets in the 1980s with other religious students from the region who would later come to form the hard core of the Taliban movement.
Later, Akhundzada became the main religious adviser to Mullah Omar.
After the capture of Kabul in 1996, he presided over Islamic courts and then acquired the post of regional minister for the promotion of virtue and the repression of vice.
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After 2001, he became a respected religious judge.
It issues fatwas on controversial issues such as the legitimacy of suicide bombings or the appropriateness of a fight against Islamic State, so
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