Osama bin Mohammed bin Awad bin Laden, also rendered as Usama bin Ladin, was a founder of the pan-Islamic militant organization al-Qaeda. The group is designated as a terrorist group by the United Nations Security Council, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the European Union, and various countries.
The Taliban, which refers to itself as the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (IEA), is a Deobandi Islamist religious-political movement and military organization in Afghanistan, regarded by many governments and organizations as terrorists.
Hamid Karzai is an Afghan politician who served as President of Afghanistan from 22 December 2001 to 29 September 2014. He is also the leader of the Popalzai Durrani tribe of Kandahar.
Gulbuddin Hekmatyar is an Afghan politician and former mujahideen leader. He is the founder and current leader of the Hezb-e-Islami Gulbuddin political party, so called after Mohammad Yunus Khalis split from Hezbi Islami in 1979 to found Hezb-i Islami Khalis. He has twice served as prime minister during the 1990s.
The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan is an unrecognized Islamic state that was first established in September 1996 by the Taliban, a Deobandi Islamist militant organization that began its governance of Afghanistan after the 1996 fall of Kabul. The group stayed in power until 2001, when it was toppled by a United States-led military coalition that invaded the country after the September 11 attacks, sparking the 20-year-long War in Afghanistan. The Taliban returned to power and re-established the Islamic Emirate after the 2021 fall of Kabul and has since had de facto control over most of the country.
Mohammad Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai is an Afghan politician, academic, and economist who served as President of Afghanistan between September 2014 and August 2021. On 15 August 2021, the Taliban took control of Afghanistan and he fled the country to the United Arab Emirates. During his escape, the Afghanistan embassy in Tajikistan asked Interpol to apprehend him for embezzling public funds.
Lashkar-e-Taiba is an Islamist terrorist organisation operating in Pakistan. It was founded in 1987 by Hafiz Saeed, Abdullah Azzam and Zafar Iqbal with funding from Osama bin Laden.
Asif Ali Zardari is a Pakistani politician who is the president of Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians and was the co-chairperson of Pakistan People's Party. He served as the 11th President of Pakistan from 2008 to 2013, the first president born after Partition. He is member of National Assembly of Pakistan since August 2018.
Rahimullah Yusufzai is a Pakistani journalist and political and security analyst, best known for having interviewed Osama bin Laden, and Afghan Taliban leader Mullah Omar. He is a war correspondent.
The Taliban insurgency began after the group's fall from power during the 2001 War in Afghanistan. The Taliban forces fought against the Afghan government, led by President Hamid Karzai, and later by President Ashraf Ghani, and against a US-led coalition of forces that has included all members of NATO; the 2021 Taliban offensive resulted in the collapse of the government of Ashraf Ghani.
Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, alternatively referred to as the Pakistani Taliban, is a Pashtun Islamist armed student group that is an umbrella organization of various student militant groups based along the Afghan–Pakistani border. Most Taliban groups in Pakistan coalesce under the TTP. In December 2007, about 13 groups united under the leadership of Baitullah Mehsud to form the TTP.
The War in Afghanistan was a conflict that lasted from 2001 to 2021 following the United States invasion of Afghanistan, when the United States and its allies drove the Taliban from power in order to deny al-Qaeda a safe base of operations in Afghanistan. It was the longest war in United States history, surpassing the Vietnam War by roughly five months. After the initial objectives were completed, a coalition of over 40 countries formed a security mission in the country called International Security Assistance Force of which certain members were involved in military combat allied with Afghanistan's government. The war mostly consisted of Taliban insurgencies fighting against the Afghan Armed Forces and allied forces; the majority of ISAF/RS soldiers and personnel were American. The war was code-named by the US as Operation Enduring Freedom (2001–2014) and Operation Freedom's Sentinel (2015–2021).
Pakistan and state-sponsored terrorism refers to the involvement of Pakistan in terrorism through the backing of various designated terrorist organizations. Pakistan has been frequently accused by various countries, including its neighbours Afghanistan, India, and Iran, as well as by the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, and France, of involvement in a variety of terrorist activities in both its local region of South Asia and beyond. Pakistan's northwestern tribal regions along the Afghanistan–Pakistan border have been described as an effective safe haven for terrorists by Western media and the United States Secretary of Defense, while India has accused Pakistan of perpetuating the insurgency in Jammu and Kashmir by providing financial support and armaments to militant groups, as well as by sending state-trained terrorists across the Line of Control and de jure India–Pakistan border to launch attacks in Indian-administered Kashmir and India proper, respectively. According to an analysis published by the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution in 2008, Pakistan was reportedly, "with the possible exception of Iran, perhaps the world's most active sponsor of terrorist groups... aiding these groups that pose a direct threat to the United States. Pakistan's active participation has caused thousands of deaths in the region; all these years Pakistan has been supportive to several terrorist groups despite several stern warnings from the international community." Daniel Byman, a professor and senior analyst of terrorism and security at the Center For Middle East Policy, also wrote that, "Pakistan is probably 2008's most active sponsor of terrorism". In 2018, the former Prime Minister of Pakistan, Nawaz Sharif, suggested that the Pakistani government played a role in the 2008 Mumbai attacks that were carried out by Lashkar-e-Taiba, a Pakistan-based Islamist terrorist group. In July 2019, Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan, on an official visit to the United States, acknowledged the presence of some 30,000–40,000 armed terrorists operating on Pakistani soil. He further stated that previous administrations were hiding this truth, particularly from the United States, for the last 15 years during the War on Terror.
The Haqqani network is an Afghan guerrilla insurgent group using asymmetric warfare to fight against US-led NATO forces and the government of Afghanistan. Maulvi Jalaluddin Haqqani and his son Sirajuddin Haqqani have led the group. It is an offshoot of the Taliban.
The Lashkar-e-Jhangvi or "Army of Jhangvi", is a Deobandi Sunni supremacist and jihadist militant organisation based in Afghanistan. The organisation operates in Pakistan and Afghanistan and is an offshoot of anti-Shia party Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan (SSP). The LeJ was founded by former SSP activists Riaz Basra, Malik Ishaq, Akram Lahori, and Ghulam Rasool Shah.
Amrullah Saleh is an Afghan politician who has claimed the office of acting president of Afghanistan since 17 August 2021. He has also been served as the 5th first vice president of Afghanistan from February 2020 until August 2021 and served as the Minister of Interior Affairs of Afghanistan in 2018 and 2019 and as head of the National Directorate of Security (NDS) from 2004, until his resignation in 2010.
Abdul Ghani Baradar is an Afghan militant who was one of the founders of the Taliban in Afghanistan, and the deputy of its leader, Mohammed Omar. He is known by the honorific Mullah, and Omar nicknamed him 'Baradar', which means 'brother', or Mullah Brother. Baradar was captured in Pakistan by a team of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) officers in February 2010 and was released on 24 October 2018 at the request of the United States. Since his release he played an increasingly influential role within the Afghan Taliban movement.
Pakistan's role in the War on Terror is a widely discussed topic among policy-makers of various countries, political analysts and international delegates around the world. Pakistan has simultaneously received allegations of harbouring and aiding terrorists and commendation for its anti-terror efforts. Since 2001, the country has also hosted millions of Afghan refugees who fled the war in Afghanistan.
The Afghanistan conflict is a series of wars that has been fought in Afghanistan since 1978. Starting with the Saur Revolution military coup, an almost continuous series of armed conflicts has dominated and afflicted Afghanistan. The wars include:
This article summarizes the history of the War in Afghanistan (2001–2021).
