Mawlawi Mohammad Nabi Omari | |
|---|---|
 Nabi Omari at a conference | |
| First Deputy Minister for Interior Affairs | |
| Assumed office 6 October 2022 | |
| President | Hibatullah Akhundzada |
| Preceded by | Mohmand Katawazaii |
| Governor of Khost Province | |
| Assumed office 24 August 2021 | |
| Preceded by | Mohmand Katawazai |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 1968 (age 56–57) [1] Khost Province,Afghanistan |
| Profession | Politician |
Mawlawi Mohammad Nabi Omari is an Afghan politician serving as First Deputy Minister for Interior Affairs [2] under the internationally unrecognized Taliban regime since 6 October 2022. [3] He was also appointed Acting Governor of Khost Province in late August 2021. [4] Omari was held for nearly twelve years in extrajudicial detention at the United States Guantanamo Bay detainment camps,in Cuba. [5] His Guantanamo Internment Serial Number was 832. American intelligence analysts estimate that he was born in 1968,in Khost,Afghanistan. He arrived at the Guantanamo detention camps on October 28,2002. [6]
According to scholars at the Brookings Institution,led by Benjamin Wittes,Omari was being held on allegations that he was affiliated with al-Qaeda and the Taliban and that he was part of the Taliban leadership. [7] During his Combatant Status Review Tribunal Omari acknowledged he had worked for the Taliban,but claimed that was prior to the September 11 attacks. [8] He said that after the US invasion,he had been a loyal supporter of the Hamid Karzai government,and that he had been a covert operative for a US intelligence officer he knew only as "Mark".[ citation needed ] Omari was one of the 71 individuals deemed too innocent to charge,but too dangerous to release by the Joint Review Task Force under the Obama administration. [9]
He was transported from Guantanamo Bay to Qatar on June 1,2014. [10] Omari and four other men known as the Taliban five were exchanged for captured U.S. soldier Bowe Bergdahl. The men were held by the Qataris in a form of house arrest. The swap was brokered by the Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani,the Emir of Qatar. Omari and the others were required to stay in Qatar for a year as a condition of their release. [11]
