Talk of a rift among the Taliban ranks has been circulating since the group’s return to power in Afghanistan over four years ago, after the U.S. and its allies left the country haphazardly. The Taliban had put forward an apparently unified front during the two decades of the so-called war on terror. That unity did not seem to last long once the war was won, and reports of a fissure among the Taliban leadership came out within the first ten months of their return to Kabul. Many experts suggested that the Taliban were divided on various lines, including ethnicity – the group predominantly consists of Pashtuns, but not exclusively. Experts also pointed to rising issues over different policy matters.
These divisions have, however, never come to light as openly as they are now.
A suicide attack that killed the Taliban minister of refugees and repatriation, Khalil Rahman Haqqani, in December 2024, significantly heightened tensions within the group’s ranks, particularly between the leader of the Haqqani Network, Sirajuddin Haqqani, and the Taliban’s supreme leader,
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