In Afghanistan, the Taliban’s anti-Daesh squad gains a reputation for ruthlessness

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A Pashtun boy warily eyes an Afghan government soldier in Zabul province, southern Afghanistan. The region is at the heart of a bitter fight for supremacy between Taliban and Daesh rivals. (AN Photo/Chris Sands)
Updated 28 June 2018
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In Afghanistan, the Taliban’s anti-Daesh squad gains a reputation for ruthlessness

  • The elusive commando ‘Red Unit’ strikes fear even among its fanatical rivals
  • The insurgent's commandos also target Afghan forces and Nato troops

KABUL: Hunkered down in mountain trenches overlooking a vast area of desert and mud-walled houses in southern Afghanistan, the Daesh fighters opened fire on the approaching Taliban, wounding four and sending the others scrambling for cover.

It was the start of a battle neither group could afford to lose. Whoever triumphed would take a significant step toward controlling the future of one of the world’s most intractable insurgencies.

Daesh wanted to turn Afghanistan into the latest outpost in its self-declared caliphate, while the Taliban feared being overrun by the fanatics who made their name sweeping all before them in Iraq and Syria.

What happened next — in the fall of 2015 — has gone down in radical circles as the moment a new Taliban rapid-response force gained a decisive advantage in the extremists’ bitter civil war.

Now notorious among civilians and fellow militants, the force has gone on to play a key role in the Taliban’s increasingly violent and effective campaign to retake control of Afghanistan. It is the spearhead of what the Afghan government refers to as the “Red Unit” or “Danger Unit” — an elite group of thousands of insurgent commandos equipped with US-made assault rifles, night vision apparatus, heavy machine guns and 82mm rockets.

In contrast to their rival’s growing strength, Daesh has resorted to staging spectacular attacks on soft targets in Kabul, seemingly conceding that it cannot hold swathes of territory against its better organized foe.

“Before the war we were walking around jointly, not bothering each other,” recalled Qazi Halim, a nom de guerre for one of the Taliban’s quick-reaction force commandos. Now “this is the only unit which has defeated Daesh and of which Daesh is afraid,” he said.

Halim, a Pashtun in his late 20s or early 30s, was speaking to Arab News shortly before he was killed in a US airstrike on Tuesday.

A three-day cease-fire between the Taliban and the Afghan government during Eid this month led to joyous scenes across Afghanistan, as insurgents mingled freely with soldiers and government officials. The Taliban said that the brief truce proved the fundamentalist movement was united and that “all combatants strictly follow” orders. This has not always been the case, however.

For months before the 2015 confrontation in Zabul province, a fierce struggle for the right to lead Afghanistan’s insurgency had been unfolding within the Taliban.

The movement was openly divided for the first time in its history as rank-and-file members reeled from the news that its spiritual founder, Mullah Mohammed Omar, had died from natural causes in 2013, only for his closest confidants to cover up his death for more than two years. Daesh hoped to exploit the divisions and become the main insurgent faction in the region.

In response to this unprecedented challenge to its dominance, the Taliban stepped up plans to activate a special forces commando unit tasked with crushing any dissent within the movement’s ranks and wiping out its rivals, Halim told Arab News.

In the summer of 2015, pictures began circulating on social media showing the Red Unit already in training, with recruits dressed in combat fatigues and black balaclavas doing push-ups, firing heavy machine guns and crawling through obstacle courses. But it was not until the Taliban began to fracture after Omar’s confirmed death that the commandos sprang into action.

Arab News has learnt that the Red Unit is divided into several battalion-sized teams of 300 to 350 men, picked according to how they perform at the Taliban’s training camps. Each team is given responsibility for a province. In emergencies, the teams work together to cover a zone consisting of several provinces. As well as fighting rival insurgents, they also fight Afghan government forces and US troops.

One of the first teams was sent to the province of Farah, on the Iranian border in western Afghanistan, where a Taliban splinter group under a dissident commander, Mullah Mohammed Rasool, had formed.

The Red Unit’s commandos swept into the area with devastating effect, killing several of Rasool’s men and forcing him to flee to Pakistan. Mullah Mansour Dadullah, an experienced fighter from a notorious insurgent family, stepped into his place.

Under Dadullah’s leadership, the Taliban splinter group declared its allegiance to Daesh and moved into Zabul, an impoverished region of wadis, deserts and mountains dominated by ethnic Pashtuns. It settled in the district of Khak-e Afghan in the north of the province.

Out of the Afghan government’s reach and initially welcomed by local villagers, the Daesh fighters began to expand their area of operations. They soon targeted Highway One, the main road linking Kabul and the south of Afghanistan.

After a number of pinprick ambushes in which they kidnapped civilians traveling along the highway, they abducted dozens of Hazaras, an ethnic minority of predominantly Shiite Muslims. Those taken hostage included women and children.

The abductions provoked outrage among Afghans in Kabul, who criticized the government for being unable to protect its own people. The Taliban sensed an opportunity. Eager to win more public support for its insurgency and desperate to prevent Daesh from making further inroads into its territory, the movement came up with a plan to hit back.

First the Taliban sent a delegation of muftis — Islamic legal experts — and clerics to Khak-e Afghan. The delegation and a group of Daesh scholars spent a week trying to persuade each other that only their group should be allowed to operate in the country.

When the Taliban muftis ordered their rivals to surrender, the talks broke down. Rather than wait for tensions to cool, the Taliban then sent hundreds of Red Unit commandos to the area in November 2015. They were drawn from the teams for the provinces of Zabul, Ghazni and Maidan Wardak.

Halim, from Maidan Wardak, was among them. The first name of his nom de guerre — Qazi — is an honorific denoting someone trained in Islamic law. In Arabic and Pashto, it means “judge.” The second part of the nom de guerre — Halim — has been changed to protect his identity because he did not have the Taliban’s permission to talk to Arab News.

Arriving in Khak-e Afghan, he found the Daesh fighters were a mixture of Afghans from across the country and militants from Uzbekistan, who had their families with them. Villagers reported seeing them traveling around the area on motorbikes decorated with Dadullah’s name and the slogan “Long live Daesh.”

The Red Unit tried for a final time to convince the Daesh militants to surrender, sending a squad toward their mountain headquarters with an offer of clemency. It was then that the Daesh fighters opened fire, injuring four of the Talibs and triggering the battle that would change the course of the insurgents’ civil war.

A relative of Dadullah’s who tried to evacuate the Daesh leader after the fighting began confirmed to Arab News that the Taliban’s commandos were in Khak-e Afghan at the time. Speaking on condition of anonymity, he said: “They did the fighting and they cleared the area.” He added that their only aim seemed to be “to kill Mansour Dadullah.”

After the advance squad was hit, the Red Unit commandos regrouped and resumed their attack at night, this time breaking through the Daesh lines. They began heading deeper into the mountains, killing dozens of fighters as they progressed.

Over the next few days they searched local houses and found a number of the kidnapped Hazaras tied up and blindfolded. Others lay dead, “slaughtered just hours before,” said Halim.

When he and his fellow commandos captured nine of the Uzbeks alive, they assembled a makeshift Islamic court to put them on trial. After ordering them to confess in front of the hostages to being members of Daesh, they hanged all nine.

The Red Unit commandos eventually tracked down Dadullah by monitoring the military radio traffic of the surviving Daesh fighters. They arrested the leader, took him to an isolated valley and shot him.

By the end of the operation, four members of the Red Unit were dead, but word of the commandos’ strength had spread across Afghanistan, striking fear into Daesh and causing alarm within the Afghan government.

The Taliban leadership was so impressed by its troops’ showing in Zabul that it turned them into a quick-reaction force under the leadership of its most famous commander, a Pashtun named Pir Agha.

Although much of his background remains a mystery, Agha is believed to be in his 40s and from Sangisar in the Panjwayi district of Kandahar. Afghans who have met him describe him as an uncomplicated, but persuasive, public speaker.

One businessman came face to face with Agha about a year before the Red Unit was formed, in a ramshackle bazaar in Helmand province, near Pakistan.

The businessman, who asked to remain anonymous, told Arab News that Agha gave a speech in the border town of Baramcha to a number of local traders who had assembled in a mosque there. In the speech, he denounced Daesh and asked them to donate money to the Taliban.

Agha has since stepped down from his role as head of the quick-reaction force to become the Taliban’s shadow governor for Paktika province. However, his commandos continue to call their force the “Unit of Pir Agha” in homage to his leadership.

They are currently led by Mawlawi Abdullah, a Talib from Maidan Wardak who was the main field commander in the Zabul battle.

Now the pride of the Red Unit, the quick-reaction force has proved to be an elusive and formidable enemy for both Daesh and the Afghan government. Last fall it was deployed to Achin district in Nangarhar province, eastern Afghanistan. Halim claimed a number of the Daesh fighters he encountered there were in their teens.

Then, on April 2 this year, Afghan helicopter gunships attacked a religious ceremony in the northern province of Kunduz, killing at least 36 people, including 30 children, according to a UN investigation.

The government claimed its intended target was the Red Unit. Before his death this week, Halim was unconcerned about being a wanted man. With the cease-fire over and the Taliban again on the offensive, he walked the streets of Kabul in a prayer cap and shalwar kameez — waiting for a mission that would prove to be his last.


India in mourning after over 240 killed in deadliest aviation disaster in decades

Updated 13 June 2025
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India in mourning after over 240 killed in deadliest aviation disaster in decades

  • Sole flight survivor Ramesh Viswashkumar a British national of Indian origin, is being treated at a hospital, airline confirms
  • London-bound Dreamliner with 242 people on board also killed dozens more when it crashed into a medical college hostel

NEW DELHI, India: Indian authorities were combing the site of one of India’s deadliest aviation disasters on Friday, after an Air India plane crashed in the western city of Ahmedabad less than a minute after takeoff, killing all but one of its passengers. 

The London-bound Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner, which had 242 people on board, also killed dozens more people when it crashed into a medical college hostel located just outside Ahmedabad airport and burst into flames on Thursday afternoon. 

The sole survivor, a British national of Indian origin, is being treated in a hospital, the airline confirmed. 

“We are all devastated by the air tragedy in Ahmedabad. The loss of so many lives in such a sudden and heartbreaking manner is beyond words. Condolences to all the bereaved families,” Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi wrote on social media after visiting the crash site in the capital of his home state of Gujarat. 

The passengers comprised 169 Indian nationals, 53 Britons, 7 Portuguese and one Canadian. 

The surviving passenger, who was in seat 11A next to an emergency exit in front of the plane’s wing, reportedly managed to jump out. He told Indian media that he had heard a loud noise shortly after flight AI171 took off. 

Various footage showed the plane taking off over a residential area and then sinking and disappearing from the screen, before a huge fireball could be seen rising into the sky from beyond the houses. 

Those killed on board include a family who was visiting India for Eid, a newlywed who is moving to the UK and Vijay Rupani, former chief minister of Gujarat. 

Health authorities are conducting DNA tests to identify bodies, which were mostly charred beyond recognition, as relatives take part and wait for officials to release the remains. 

Suresh Khatika, who was waiting at the Ahmedabad Civil Hospital where the DNA testing was taking place, said his niece Payal Khatika was among the passengers. 

“Payal was going for further studies and she has taken a loan for it. She was really preparing herself for the day when she would go to the UK for studies,” Khatika told Arab News. 

“It is really tragic that her dream crashed like this. We are in deep pain, and don’t know how to react.” 

Many Indians have also taken to social media to mourn the victims, as their stories circulated widely. Among them is Dr. Pratik Joshi, who was reportedly bringing his wife, Dr. Komi Vyas, and three young children to move to the UK. A picture of the family, believed to be taken on the plane and shared with relatives before takeoff, has garnered millions of views online as messages of condolence poured in. 

In addition to the passengers and crew, dozens more people perished as they were caught in the path of the plane crash. 

Thakur Ravi, a cook at B.J. Medical College, said his mother and two-year-old daughter, who had been on the side of the building where the plane had crashed, were missing. 

“Other helpers and cooks managed to escape but my mother and daughter have been missing since yesterday,” Ravi told Arab News. 

“We are frantically hoping against hope to have my family back. It was a horrible incident. It seemed as if the sky had fallen on us.” 

Indian Civil Aviation Minister Ram Mohan Naidu said a formal investigation headed by the Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau has been launched. 

Boeing said it was in touch with Air India and stood “ready to support them” over the incident. The UK and US air accident investigation agencies also announced they were sending teams to support their Indian counterparts.

India, the world’s third-largest aviation market, has endured several fatal air crashes on its soil, including in 1996, when two planes collided mid-air over New Delhi, killing around 350 people. In 2010, an Air-India Express jet crashed and burst into flames at Mangalore airport in south-west India, killing 158 of the 166 passengers and crew onboard. 


Judge blocks Trump’s election executive order, siding with Democrats who called it overreach

Updated 13 June 2025
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Judge blocks Trump’s election executive order, siding with Democrats who called it overreach

ATLANTA: A federal judge on Friday blocked President Donald Trump’s attempt to overhaul elections in the US, siding with a group of Democratic state attorneys general who challenged the effort as unconstitutional.
The Republican president’s March 25 executive order sought to compel officials to require documentary proof of citizenship for everyone registering to vote for federal elections, accept only mailed ballots received by Election Day and condition federal election grant funding on states adhering to the new ballot deadline.
The group of attorneys general said the directive “usurps the States’ constitutional power and seeks to amend election law by fiat.” The White House has defended the order as “standing up for free, fair and honest elections” and called proof of citizenship a “commonsense” requirement.


Hong Kong rights group shuts down after years of advocating for workers

Updated 13 June 2025
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Hong Kong rights group shuts down after years of advocating for workers

  • Founded in 1994, organization maintained a database tracking workers’ strikes, protests, workplace accidents and other labor rights incidents in China

HONG KONG: A Hong Kong group that advocated for workers rights for decades announced its shutdown abruptly on Thursday, citing financial difficulties and debt issues.
China Labor Bulletin planned to stop updating its website content and appeared to have deleted Facebook and Instagram social media accounts used by the nonprofit rights organization.
“The company can no longer maintain operations and has decided to dissolve and initiate the relevant procedures,” it said in a statement on an archived web page Friday.
Founded in 1994, organization maintained a database tracking workers’ strikes, protests, workplace accidents and other labor rights incidents in China.
As dozens of civil society groups disbanded or left Hong Kong in the wake of the 2020 Beijing-imposed national security law, China Labor Bulletin continued providing valuable resources for journalists and academics in the southern Chinese city.
Critics say the drastic political changes in Hong Kong indicated the decline of Western-style civil liberties that China promised to keep intact when the former British colony returned to Chinese rule in 1997. However, Beijing and Hong Kong governments insisted the law was crucial to bring stability to the city following massive anti-government protests in 2019.
China Labor Bulletin’s founder Han Dongfang, a former railway worker who participated in the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests, did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Associated Press. He told the Central News Agency of Taiwan that the shutdown was his decision and he would stay in Hong Kong.
Han’s decision appeared sudden to many Hong Kong civil society observers. Three weeks ago, he wrote on social media platform LinkedIn about his work anniversary and his team’s progress.
“Let’s keep our faith up at this abnormal time and continue our important work,” he said.


India in mourning after deadliest aviation disaster in decades

Updated 13 June 2025
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India in mourning after deadliest aviation disaster in decades

  • Sole flight survivor, a British citizen of Indian origin, is being treated in hospital
  • Family members provide DNA samples to help identify crash victims

NEW DELHI: Indian authorities were combing the site of one of India’s deadliest aviation disasters on Friday, after an Air India plane crashed in the western city of Ahmedabad less than a minute after takeoff, killing all but one of its passengers.

The London-bound Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner, which had 242 people on board, killed dozens more people when it crashed into a medical college hostel just outside Ahmedabad airport and burst into flames on Thursday afternoon.

The sole survivor, a British citizen of Indian origin, is being treated in hospital, the airline confirmed.

“We are all devastated by the air tragedy in Ahmedabad. The loss of so many lives in such a sudden and heartbreaking manner is beyond words. Condolences to all the bereaved families,” Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi wrote on social media after visiting the crash site in the capital of his home state of Gujarat.

The passengers comprised 169 Indian citizens, 53 Britons, 7 Portuguese and a Canadian.

The surviving passenger, who was in seat 11A next to an emergency exit in front of the plane’s wing, reportedly managed to jump out. He told Indian media that he had heard a loud noise shortly after flight AI171 took off.

Various footage showed the plane taking off over a residential area and then sinking and disappearing from the screen, before a huge fireball could be seen rising into the sky from beyond the houses.

Those killed on board include a family visiting India for Eid, a newlywed who was moving to the UK and Vijay Rupani, former chief minister of Gujarat.

Health authorities are conducting DNA tests to identify bodies, most of which were charred beyond recognition.

Suresh Khatika, who was waiting at the Ahmedabad Civil Hospital where the DNA testing was taking place, said his niece Payal Khatika was among the passengers.

“Payal was going for further studies and she has taken a loan for it. She was really preparing herself for the day when she would go to the UK for studies,” Khatika told Arab News.

“It is really tragic that her dream crashed like this. We are in deep pain, and don’t know how to react.”

Many Indians have taken to social media to mourn the victims, as their stories circulated widely. Among them is Dr. Pratik Joshi, who was reportedly bringing his wife, Dr. Komi Vyas, and three young children to move to the UK. A picture of the family, believed to be taken on the plane and shared with relatives before takeoff, has garnered millions of views online as messages of condolence poured in.

In addition to the passengers and crew, dozens more people caught in the path of the plane crash perished.

Thakur Ravi, a cook at B.J. Medical College, said his mother and 2-year-old daughter, who were on the side of the building where the plane crashed, were missing. 

“Other helpers and cooks managed to escape but my mother and daughter have been missing since yesterday,” Ravi told Arab News.

“We are frantically hoping against hope to have my family back. It was a horrible incident. It seemed as if the sky had fallen on us.”

India’s Civil Aviation Minister Ram Mohan Naidu said a formal investigation led by the Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau has been launched.

Boeing said it was in touch with Air India and stood “ready to support them” over the incident. The UK and US air accident investigation agencies also announced they were sending teams to support their Indian counterparts.

India, the world’s third-largest aviation market, has suffered several fatal air crashes on its soil, including in 1996, when two planes collided in mid-air over New Delhi, killing about 350 people. In 2010, an Air-India Express jet crashed and burst into flames at Mangalore airport in south-west India, killing 158 of the 166 passengers and crew onboard.


Japan’s foreign minister praises Djibouti’s work on maritime security

Updated 13 June 2025
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Japan’s foreign minister praises Djibouti’s work on maritime security

TOKYO: Japanese foreign minister Takeshi Iwaya met with Dileita Mohamed Dileita, President of the National Assembly of the Republic of Djibouti, on Friday and praised the “deepening of cooperation between the two countries in the field of maritime security.”

Iwaya stated that Djibouti, located at the southern end of the Red Sea and an important sea lane linking Europe and Asia, is a strategically important partner in the quest for a “Free and Open Indo-Pacific (FOIP).”

Referring to the good relations between the two countries and his own special attachment toward Japan, President Dileita expressed his appreciation and gratitude for Japan’s development cooperation in various fields and for the Self-Defense Force facility in Djibouti, noting the strategic importance of his country.

The two sides exchanged views on issues that included the regional situation in Africa and in East Asia and agreed to further strengthening bilateral relations and cooperation in regional and international arena, with a view to TICAD 9 in August and Expo 2025 Osaka, Kansai, Japan.

• This article originally appeared on Arab News Japan