Najibullah's regime. Mohammad Najibullah: biography, family, party activities. Here is another version of Najibullah's death

Muhammad Najibullah (in another transcription Mohammad Najibullah ; Pashto and Dari محمد نجیب‌الله - Mohammad Najibullah; August 6, Gardez - September 27, Kabul) - Afghan statesman and political figure, Secretary General of the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan and President of the DRA from to. Also known as Dr. Najib. Previously, he held the position of head of the State Information Service (KhAD). As president, he pursued a policy of “national reconciliation” and contributed to the transformation of the political and social life of the country. Three years after the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan in 1992, Najibullah's government was overthrown by the armed opposition. In recent years, he lived on the territory of the UN mission in Kabul until he was captured in 1996 and then executed by the Taliban.

Life path

Youth

Muhammad Najibullah was born on August 6, 1947 in the village of Milan near Gardez (Afghan province of Paktia) in the family of a civil servant Akhtar Muhammad, who worked as a consul in Peshawar; By nationality, Pashtun is a Ghilzai from the Ahmedzai clan of the Suleimanheil tribe. His grandfather was the chief of the Ahmedzai tribe. Najbullah spent most of his childhood on the Afghan-Pakistan border in the Peshawar region. After graduating from Habibiya Gymnasium in 1965, Najib entered the medical faculty of Kabul University. In the same year, he joined the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan, headed the illegal Democratic Union of Students, and became famous for his oratorical abilities and athletic achievements in weightlifting and wrestling, for which he was nicknamed “the bull.”

Party activities

The president

At the beginning of January 1987, the Declaration of the Revolutionary Council of the DRA “On National Reconciliation” was adopted, which provided for the curtailment of active hostilities by Soviet and government troops and the settlement of the situation in the country through negotiations.

After the departure of Soviet troops (), he remained in power for another three years.

Last years

Four days after Soviet troops left Afghanistan, Najibullah declared a state of emergency in the country by decree. In the spring, the Mujahideen, supported by Pakistani artillery, launched a massive offensive near Jalalabad. On April 18, in an interview with the Izvestia newspaper, the president stated the following:

The USA, Great Britain and other Western countries expected the Najibullah regime to fall soon, but their expectations were not met. In the last two or three years, when a limited contingent of Soviet troops was preparing to withdraw, at the cost of great effort and expense, it was possible to turn the government forces of President Najibullah into a fairly combat-ready army. In July, the government army managed to deliver a significant blow to the enemy, defeating the joint forces of the Mujahideen near Jalalabad. In a letter to Mikhail Gorbachev dated November 15, 1989, Najibullah wrote that within 8 months the Afghan armed forces managed to repel the Mujahideen in all main directions, but the government needs new supplies of weapons, without which the military situation on the distant approaches to Kabul will become sharply complicated.

"Vatan"

Overthrow

For three years, Najibullah's government managed to stay in power until the Soviet Union stopped providing military support to Afghanistan. In 1990, USSR Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze submitted a proposal to eliminate the work of the Politburo Commission on Afghanistan, which was soon approved. Following this, in September 1991, US Secretary of State James Baker and the new USSR Foreign Minister Boris Pankin signed an agreement to stop the supply of weapons to the conflicting parties in Afghanistan from January 1, 1992. The cessation of Soviet military assistance to Afghanistan weakened Najibullah's position. In his book "Mission in Afghanistan", the former USSR Ambassador to Afghanistan Nikolai Yegorychev acknowledges Najibullah's strong dependence on the Soviet Union. In a televised address to the nation on July 29, 1986, Najibullah said:

Successive governments during the civil war demanded that the UN extradite Najibullah. In - gg. the issue of granting political asylum to Najibullah was raised with the support of the UN by the US State Department. The ousted president, like many other members of the PDPA, was shocked by a statement made in an interview with then Russian Foreign Minister Andrei Kozyrev about “Moscow’s reluctance to deal with the fragments of the past Afghan regime.” As the situation in the country deteriorated, the era of Dr. Najib began to be perceived by Afghans as a period of stability. So, in the first half of the 1990s. Hunger demonstrations took place in Kabul and other cities, during which the slogans “Long live Najibullah!” .

Najib himself has spent the last four years in a UN mission without a break. While at the UN mission, Najibullah worked on translating The Great Game, a book about the struggle between the Russian and British empires for influence in Afghanistan in the 19th century. On 26 September, following the capture of Kabul by the Islamic militia Taliban, Najibullah, his brother and three other former government members were taken from their hideout by militants. The former president was brutally tortured and executed the next day.

Execution

The last days of Muhammad Najibullah still raise many questions. According to some reports, before the fall of Kabul, Najibullah met with certain people who persuaded him not to leave the city. Taliban emissaries met with his wife, telling her that the Taliban were not just going to take Kabul, but to restore Najibullah to power. According to the book by Ahmed Rashid, Najibullah fell into the hands of the Taliban between 1 and 2 am; he also writes that the former president was not hanged with a rope, but with an electrical wire. There is a legend that before his death, Muhammad Najibullah grabbed a machine gun (according to another version, a pistol) from the Pashtun who was escorting him and started a fight in which he died, and he was hanged already dead. In his book Shadow of the Taliban, Ahmed Rashid describes the last moments of Dr. Najib's life as follows:

The Taliban burst into his room and subjected him and his brother to severe beatings, and when they lost consciousness, they were thrown into the back of a small truck, which took the prisoners to the presidential palace in the dark through the night streets. There Najibullah was castrated, and he was dragged tied to a jeep through the streets of the city, and finally they put a bullet in his head. His brother had to endure the same torture, but instead of a bullet, he received a noose around his neck. Both corpses were hanged on a concrete pillar near the presidential palace, not far from the UN building in Kabul. Both had cigarettes clutched in their hands, and their pockets were stuffed with Afghan money - which, according to the Taliban, should have clearly demonstrated that the accused were executed for corruption and unbridled life.

This version is supported by the Pakistani media, which wrote in those days that Najib was apparently dragged behind a jeep and then shot in the head. The famous Russian orientalist V. Plastun, who worked for a long time in Afghanistan and often met with Najibullah and his opponents, describes these events as follows:

Najibullah was betrayed many times. But in his most terrible hour, he found the strength not to betray either Afghanistan, or his people, or himself. Thanks to his remarkable strength, due to which the nickname “Bull” stuck to him from his youth, he managed to disperse the guards, take away a pistol from one of the officers and kill (or seriously wound) his brother Aslam Bek. What followed was a nightmare. Najibullah suffered terrible torture, but was not broken. The terrible execution, which shocked even his enemies, outraged all Afghans, no matter which side of the barricades they were on, drew a line under his life...

The Taliban forbade burying Najibullah according to Islamic customs, but despite this, prayers were read for him in Quetta and Peshawar, where Pashtun nationalists still remembered him. The next day, his corpse and that of his brother were removed and handed over to representatives of the Red Cross for burial. Muhammad Najibullah was buried in his native Gardez by representatives of the Ahmadzai tribe, to which he belonged.

Betrayed many times, Mohammad Najibullah found the strength not to betray his people and his country. The terrible execution of the former president shocked not only his supporters, but also his enemies, and outraged the entire Afghan people.

Biography

Mohammed Najibullah - statesman, from 1986 to 1992. Born in the village of Milan, near the city of Gardez, on August 6, 1947. His father Akhtar Mohammad worked at the Peshawar consulate, his grandfather was the leader of the Ahmedzai tribe. Mohammad Najibullah spent his childhood near the Pakistani-Afghan border and graduated from high school there.

In 1965, Najibullah joined the democratic party and headed the illegal democratic society of students. In 1969, he was arrested for calling the people to prepare for an uprising, participating in demonstrations and strikes. In January 1970, he was arrested again, this time for insulting the United States of America and acting contrary to the country's neutrality. During the demonstration, he and the students threw eggs at the car of Spiro Agnew, the Vice President of the United States.

First exile

In 1975, Mohammad Najibullah graduated from the medical university in Kabul, after which he focused even more on the activities of the party, in 1977 he was appointed a member of the Central Committee of the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan. After the revolution in Saur, he headed the revolutionary council and party committee in Kabul. But disagreements within the party forced him to leave the capital, Najibullah was sent to Iran as an ambassador. But in October 1978, he was removed from his post and deprived of citizenship, as a result of which Mohammad Najibullah was forced to leave for Moscow, where he hid until December 1979, until Soviet troops entered Afghanistan.

Homecoming

Returning to the country, Najibullah began to manage the security service, increasing its staff to thirty thousand employees, before which only 120 people worked in the security service. However, even here he was not allowed to work in peace; many organizations, including Amnesty International, accused him of involvement in illegal arrests, torture and human rights violations. But there was no evidence for the accusations; during his service in the Khad there was no such mass terror and extermination of his own people as during the reign of Amin.

Afghan: Mohammad Najibullah is the country's president

On November 30, 1986, Najibullah was elected president of Afghanistan. But with his coming to leadership of the country, a split began again in the party: some supported Karmal, others supported the current president. In order to somehow reconcile the warring parties, in January 1987 they adopted the Declaration “On National Reconciliation”. The declaration prescribed the end of active hostilities and the settlement of the conflict through peaceful negotiations.

In December 1989, just days after Soviet troops withdrew from Afghanistan, the Mujahideen launched an attack on Jalalabad. Mohammad Najibullah announced in the country. On March 5, 1990, the trial of the arrested Khalqists began. In response to this, the country's Minister of Defense Shahnawaz Tanay organized Hiding in one of the bunkers, Mohammad Najibullah gave the order to suppress the rebellion, and by early March the resistance was suppressed. The organizer of the mutiny fled to Pakistan, where he subsequently joined Hekmatyar’s gang.

Betrayal on all sides

In 1990, Shevardnadze proposed eliminating the Commission for Work in Afghanistan, his decision was approved, and at the same time the supply of weapons was stopped. Thus, the country was left without the support of the USSR, and with it President Najibullah Mohammad. Political science is a fickle and fickle science; the next blow was dealt to the United States. In 1991, James Baker signed a decree stopping the supply of weapons and ammunition to the conflicting parties in Afghanistan. This greatly weakened Najibullah's influence. On April 16, 1992, Najibullah handed over his post to Abdur Rahim Khatef, who became president. And already in April of the same year he organized a coup that brought the Mujahideen to power.

In the fall of 1992, generals Hekmatyar and Massoud accused each other of treason and, leaving military equipment and weapons depots, left Kabul. At the same time, the USSR liquidated its embassy in Afghanistan. Najibullah and his supporters were offered political asylum by a number of countries, including Russia and the United States, but he decided to stay in Kabul, not wanting to abandon the country at such a difficult time.

Before the capture of the city, he managed to transport his wife, children and sister to Delhi. His brother Shapur Ahmadzai, the chief of security Jafsar, the head of the office Tuhi and Najibullah Mohammad remained in Kabul. forced the country's former president to take refuge in the Indian embassy and then in the UN office. The country's governments, constantly changing in 1995 and 1996, demanded the extradition of Najibullah. The harder was the blow dealt by the former allies. Kozyrev (Minister of Foreign Affairs) said that Moscow does not want to have anything to do with the remnants of the previous regime in Afghanistan.

Last Hero

On September 26, 1996, the Taliban captured Najibullah and his supporters were taken from the UN office. He was offered to sign a document recognizing the Pakistan-Afghan border, but he refused. After severe torture, former President Mohammad Najibullah was sentenced to death. The execution took place on September 27, Najibullah and his brother were tied to a car and dragged to the presidential palace, where they were later hanged.

According to the customs of Islam, the Taliban forbade Najibullah to be buried, but the people still remembered and honored his memory: people in Peshawar and Quetta secretly read prayers for him. When his body was finally handed over to the Red Cross, the Ahmadzai tribe, of which his grandfather was a leader, buried him in his hometown of Gardez.

On the twelfth anniversary of Najibullah's death, a meeting was held for the first time to honor his memory. The head of the Watan Party of Afghanistan, Jabarkhel, suggested that Mohammad Najibullah was killed by enemies and opponents of the people on orders from outside. A survey of residents conducted in 2008 showed that 93.2% of the population were supporters of Najibullah.

I decided to clarify the details of Najibula’s death after his overthrow.
What I read simply shocked me.

I wanted to pay tribute to the memory of this man - our ally, of whom Russia did not have and still has many.

The withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan began on May 15, 1988, in accordance with the Geneva Agreements on a political settlement of the situation around the DRA concluded in April of the same year. On February 15, 1989, the last Soviet soldier left Afghanistan. With the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan, a difficult situation developed for government agencies and the Afghan army, since the Kabul regime was left alone against the armed opposition. Four days after the withdrawal of Soviet troops, a state of emergency was declared in the country.

Pakistani and American officials expected a quick victory for the Mujahideen. However, within six months these expectations were not met. As a result of the timely supply of weapons and ammunition from the USSR, the Afghan armed forces were able to repel multiple attacks by armed opposition units on Jalalabad, Gardez, Ghazni, Kandahar, Shindand, Faizabad, and Salang. On May 4, 1990, the state of emergency was lifted by presidential decree.

For three years, Najibullah's government managed to stay in power. Shortly after the August events in the USSR in 1991, Foreign Minister of the RSFSR Andrei Kozyrev said: “In Afghanistan, everything is ready for a settlement - only Soviet support for the “extremists” led by Najibullah is preventing this.” On November 15 of the same year, USSR Foreign Minister Boris Pankin gave official consent to stop military supplies to the Kabul regime.

On January 1, 1992, Russia stopped supplying all weapons and ammunition to government forces and, since that time, the situation in Afghanistan began to deteriorate noticeably. The country began to experience an acute shortage of fuel and food, and the opposition, against this background, intensified its propaganda and subversive activities, winning over government military personnel to its side.

Mujahideen detachments began to capture one province after another, getting closer and closer to Kabul. Soviet General Lyakhovsky in his book “Tragedy and Valor of Afghanistan” cites an interesting point:

The last seven of our military advisers left Afghanistan on April 13th. As Major General V.V. Lagoshin told me, the night before Najibullah invited him to his place and said that the military advisers urgently needed to leave Afghanistan, since in the very near future power would pass to the opposition, and he himself had only days left as president five. At the same time, he added that although the Soviets were traitors, he considered it his duty to send the military advisers home safe and sound. Indeed, when the administration of the Kabul airfield began to put forward various obstacles regarding the reception and departure of the Soviet plane, Najibullah personally came to the airfield and assisted in sending advisers to Tashkent.

Najibullah lost control of the domestic political situation immediately after he announced his willingness to resign on March 18, 1992 to make way for a neutral interim government. The President, along with his brother Shapur Ahmadzai, his chief of staff, Tukhi, and his personal security chief, Jafsar, took refuge at the UN mission in Kabul. On April 28, Mujahideen detachments led by A. Sh. Masud entered Kabul without a fight, overthrowing the regime of the PDPA party, which had ruled the country for 14 years.

With the fall of the PDPA regime and Najibullah's departure from the political arena, peace never came in Afghanistan. The civil war in Afghanistan unfolded with even greater ferocity, and the country found itself torn apart by armed confrontation between detachments of Mujahideen field commanders. Against this background, the Najibullah regime began to be assessed by people as more preferable in contrast to the civil strife of the Mujahideen, and therefore it is no coincidence that a new wave of refugees from Kabul left the capital with the words: “Long live Najibullah!”

Mohammad Najibullah has spent the last four years living in the UN mission without a break. On September 27, 1996, the Taliban captured Kabul. They broke into the UN mission building, where Najibullah and his brother had been staying since his overthrow, and took them both out. According to UN officials, Najibullah was captured at 1:30 a.m. and killed at 4:30 a.m. He was tortured and shot.

Having tied the body of the murdered president to a jeep, the Taliban dragged him 2 km to the Ariana intersection, located near the Arg presidential palace. They hung the mutilated and bloody body of Najibullah and his brother Shahpur Ahmadzai from a steel wire noose from a fortified checkpoint at the gates of the presidential palace. Taliban commander Noor Hakmal said that "We killed him because he was a killer of our people." The Taliban, also mocking the body of the murdered president and his brother, inserted Afghani bills and cigarettes between their fingers, into their mouths, noses and pockets.

More photos of the execution

Here is another version of Najibullah's death

Russian scientists V. Plastun and V. Andrianov, in the book “Najibullah. Afghanistan in the grip of geopolitics” (1998), came to the conclusion that the assassination of Dr. Najibullah was one of the priority tasks of the Pakistani inter-service intelligence. For a long time, heading the State Security Service and then being president of the country, Najibullah interfered with the implementation of the goals of Pakistani military intelligence in Afghanistan. In particular, the ex-president was an ardent advocate of solving the problem of divided Pashtunistan (which was divided according to the 1893 treaty between Afghanistan and Pakistan, the latter at that time being part of British India). One of Dr. Najib’s associates, Sultan Ali Keshtmand, who published his memoirs in three volumes in London in 2000 under the title “Political Memories and Historical Events,” writes: “He (Nadjibullah-I.R.) from his youth passionately dealt with the problems of his fellow tribesmen side of the Afghan-Pakistani border and belonged to that group of Parchamists who were very passionate about this problem during the period of Parchamist rule in the 80s, he and some of his comrades directed great efforts to work among the Pashtun tribes." As head of the country's intelligence services from 1980 to 1986, and President of Afghanistan from 1986 to early 1992, Dr. Najib took concrete steps in this direction. Meanwhile, Pakistani military intelligence was fully aware of Najibullah's connections with Pashtun tribal leaders in the "independent tribal belt."

V. Plastun and V. Andrianov emphasize that after the capture of the Afghan capital by the Taliban, Pakistani intelligence services realized that they now had a unique chance to once and for all resolve the problem of Pashtunistan and the issue of the Afghan-Pakistani border. The fact is that in 1993, the agreement concluded between Great Britain and Afghanistan in 1893 for a hundred years, regarding the conditionality of the state border between the two states, expired, and the Pakistani authorities had to finally resolve this issue in their favor.

This version is also supported by the famous Afghan journalist Razok Mamun, who recently published a book in Kabul entitled “Undisclosed Secrets. Secrets of the Murder of Dr. Najib.”

V. Plastun and V. Andrianov give an interesting version. They note that long before these events, a document was fabricated in the depths of the Pakistani intelligence services on the letterhead of Najibullah’s office captured in the presidential palace. The text written on it, dating from Najibullah's time in power, represented an agreement on the official recognition by the President and the Afghan government of the Durand Line as the official and permanent border between Afghanistan and Pakistan. This was the main goal of the Pakistani military group - to force Najibullah to sign this agreement at any cost.

Scientists further write: “Najibullah was betrayed many times. But in his most terrible hour, he found the strength not to betray either Afghanistan, or his people, or himself. He used his remarkable strength, thanks to which the nickname “Bull” stuck to him from his youth. (“Najibi Barzagov” “Najibi Gov” - I.R.), he managed to disperse the guards, take away a pistol from one of the officers and seriously wound the brother (bodyguard) of General Aslam Beg. What happened next was a nightmare. He endured terrible torture, but was not broken. was. A terrible execution, which shocked even his enemies, outraged all Afghans, no matter what side of the barricades they were on, drew a line under his life."

Najibullah about Gorbi:
“Your Gorbachev will betray us. And you too. But remember - then there will never be an Afghanistan allied to you again. Because Afghans do not forget betrayal.”

In conclusion, I would like to say: PEACE TO YOUR ASHES, FRIEND! AND IF YOU CAN, THEN FORGIVE YOU, FOR IT WAS NOT THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE THAT BETRAYED YOU, BUT INDIVIDUALS WHO CAN’T BE CALLED PEOPLE!

Mohammad Najibullah was born on August 6, 1947 in Kabul in the family of a civil servant, Akhtar Mohammad. By origin, he is a Pashtun from the Ahmadzai clan of the Suleimankhel tribe of the Ghilzai tribal union. His family roots are in the province of Paktia. Plastun and Adrianov in their work “Nadjibullah. Afghanistan in the grip of geopolitics” indicate the village of Milan as Najibullah’s native village. In 1964, Najibullah graduated from the Habibiya Lyceum, after which he entered the medical faculty of Kabul University. In 1965, he joined the PDPA, and since August 1971, he has been a member of the governing bodies of the legal Association of Students of Kabul University. In an interview with the Izvestia newspaper on December 29, 1989, Najibullah said about himself:

As a student, Najibullah actively participated in mass anti-government protests by the capital's youth, for which he was involved and arrested twice. In 1969 he was first arrested. At his trial, he was accused of “participating in illegal strikes and demonstrations,” “violating public safety and stirring up tension,” as well as “creating conditions for calling the people to revolt” and “provoking riots and clashes with the police.” In January of the following year, he was arrested again for participating in an anti-American demonstration in Kabul in connection with the visit of US Vice President Spiro Agnew to the country. In 1975, he graduated from Kabul University with a degree in gynecology. In the same year, by decision of the PDPA “Parcham” faction, he headed the Kabul provincial commission of the party to create cells and committees of the Democratic Youth Organization of Afghanistan in the capital and province.

Party activities

After the Saur Revolution, Najibullah became a member of the highest body of the republic, the Revolutionary Council, heading the Kabul Party Committee. On June 28, 1978, Najib was sent as DRA ambassador to Iran. However, already in October of the same year, accused along with other Parcham leaders of an anti-government conspiracy, Najib was removed from his post and deprived of citizenship. After this, he was forced to hide in Moscow, where he remained until the entry of the Soviet Army into Afghanistan.

In December 1979, upon returning to the country, Najibullah received the post of head of the State Information Service. In 1983, he was awarded the military rank of lieutenant general.

Head of State

On November 24, 1986, the XX Plenum of the PDPA Central Committee accepted the resignation of Babrak Karmal. On October 1, Mohammad Najibullah became the new chairman of the Revolutionary Council of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan.

National reconciliation policy

On December 30-31, 1986, an extraordinary expanded XXI plenum of the PDPA Central Committee was held in Kabul, at which Najibullah made a major report. At the plenum, the need and goals of national reconciliation were outlined in detail, which consisted primarily of establishing peace and security in the country and ending the fratricidal war. Najibullah put forward two directions in his report: internal and external. In domestic policy, it was proposed to cease fire on all warring sides from January 15 of the following year; to attract tribal leaders and local authorities of the tribal areas, Hazarajat and Nuristan to cooperate with the people's power; move on to dialogue with political forces in opposition, as well as boldly and openly establish contacts with the armed opposition and neutrals; create the necessary conditions and facilitate the return of Afghan refugees to their homeland.

Mohammad Najibullah with the best student during his visit to one of the country's schools.

The policy of national reconciliation began with the release of several thousand political prisoners. On January 15, 1987, the Afghan army ceased fire from all types of weapons. Najibullah called on the armed opposition to cease fire from 12 am on January 15 to 12:00 on July 16, but two days after the ceasefire by the Afghan army, the leaders of the armed opposition at a meeting in Peshawar decisively rejected the peaceful initiatives of the Afghan authorities, confirming their intention to wage armed fight to the bitter end. Despite this, during the three days of the truce, 3.5 thousand armed rebels went over to the side of the people’s power in Herat, 500 in the province of Faryab, and 120 families of Afghan refugees returned to the country. In total, by February 10, more than 20 armed groups with a total number of over 10 thousand people had gone over to the side of the authorities, and the number of refugees returning from Pakistan and Iran by mid-March had reached more than 34 thousand people.

Najibullah with workers during his visit to one of the country's factories.

On February 25, Najibullah invited the opposing side to meet for negotiations in the capital or in a neutral country in order to discuss the issue of creating a government of national accord, but opponents of the Kabul leadership did not accept this proposal. The Afghan leader, adhering to the course of national reconciliation, made a new attempt to realize his goals. In July of the same year, a multi-party system was introduced in the country. Representatives of the armed opposition were invited to take government positions in the country's leadership and were given the authority to independently create government bodies in their places of residence and ensure peace and security in the territory under their control. By the end of August, representatives of the Afghan armed opposition headed 14 districts and four provinces, and by October, 1,600 villages came under government control, the provinces of Farah and Nimruz were almost completely liberated from armed gangs, the population of which declared peace zones, 30 thousand rebels from 174 armed formations and more than 100 thousand members of their families went over to the side of the ruling government, another 90 thousand people returned from Pakistani and Iranian refugee camps. However, despite all this, the civil war in Afghanistan did not stop. The policy of national reconciliation was rejected not only by the irreconcilable opposition, but also caused contradictions within the PDPA itself, and military-political tension in the country only intensified.

Flag of Afghanistan from the time of Najibullah.

From November 30 to December 1, a meeting of the Loya Jirga was held in Kabul, during which the Constitution of Afghanistan was approved, the new name of the country was the Republic of Afghanistan, and Mohammad Najibullah was elected President of Afghanistan. Following the course of national reconciliation, the Presidium of the Revolutionary Council at the end of January next year promulgated a decree “On the pardon of some commanders of armed opposition groups previously sentenced to death in absentia,” in particular, pardoning such field commanders as Ahmad Shah Massoud, Jalaluddin Haqqani and Ismail Khan . With his coming to power, Najibullah also tried to change the existing relationship between the PDPA and the Muslim clergy. The Afghan leader and members of the country's leadership began visiting the largest mosques in Kabul and participating in Friday prayers; The government supported Islam and the clergy in the country. An Islamic Consultative Council was formed under the president, and on March 13, 1988, Najibullah announced the government's decision to open an Islamic University. For the period from January 1987 to February 1988. At the expense of public funds, 20 mosques were built in the country and 324 were under repair, the organ of the Supreme Council of Ulema and Clergy began to be published - the weekly newspaper “Ershad-e Islam”, 313 million Afghanis were allocated from the treasury for the needs of 4,200 pilgrims to Mecca and Medina and 4.7 million Afghanis for 102 pilgrims to Karbala. On the other hand, the state supported the activities of only 10 madrassas, 10 houses of “guardians of the Koran”, 134 Shiite prayer houses and 2 thousand 474 mosques out of 15 thousand in the country. According to Slinkin, the state provided salaries for about 20 thousand clergy, and according to Khristoforov, only 11,500 clergy were partially supported by the state, and the size of monthly payments to the mullahs averaged from 500 to 2,900 Afghanis, while Islamic committees organized by the opposition in the territory under its control paid clergy a monthly allowance that was three times higher than the government salary.

Tanay rebellion

In August 1989, an underground sabotage and terrorist organization was uncovered in Kabul, and soon the investigation revealed a plot to overthrow the ruling government, in which army officers were involved. By the end of the year, hundreds of people were arrested, including several generals of the Afghan army, which caused a negative reaction from the Minister of Defense and member of the Khalq faction, Shahnawaz Tanaya, who one day, leaving the president’s office, indignantly said: “This is a conspiracy against me.” personally and against the Khalqists." He took refuge in the Ministry of Defense and, threatening to raise the army, demanded the release of the arrested generals. Then Najibullah released four generals. However, this was not the end of the conflict between the Minister of Defense and the President.

On March 6, 1990, Shahnawaz Tanay led an armed revolt of the Khalqists against Najibullah. On the morning of this day, he, with a group of officers and strong security, arrived at Bagram airfield, located 50 km north of Kabul. The 4th and 15th Tank Brigades acted on his side, and also supported the 52nd Signal Regiment and the 40th Division. The general personally gave the order to launch bombing attacks on Kabul. Soon, by order of the president, the entire arsenal of forces and means was introduced against the putschists. Fierce battles between government troops and rebels took place in the area of ​​the Ministry of Defense, the Main Political Directorate of the Army and around the Bagram airbase. Having first blocked the buildings of the Ministry of Defense and the Main Political Directorate, units of the presidential guard then stormed them. Aviation located in the Mazar-i-Sharif region, which remained loyal to the president, subjected Bagram airfield to airstrikes; The Hurricane missile division fired 200 shells at the airfield, hitting the runway and aircraft parking areas. Najibullah later said: “I bombed Bagram so much that not even a stone was left of it.” At 12:25 on March 7, Tanay, along with other rebel generals and families, took off from Bagram airfield and landed in Pakistan, where he met with the chief of the Pakistani ground forces, General Aslam Beg, and the chief of Pakistani intelligence, Shamsur Rahman Kallu, and one of the leaders participated in the meeting armed opposition Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. By March 8, government troops took control of Bagram airfield. According to Slinkin

The main result of the March rebellion was that, like nothing else before, it clearly highlighted the organizational weakness and political failure of the PDPA as the ruling party. Since that time, disagreements within the top party leadership have intensified even more.<…>The mutiny also had a corrosive effect on the armed forces, the main support of the left-wing Kabul regime. In the ranks of the officer corps, distrust of the senior leadership and disappointment in party affairs increased.<…>The facts convincingly indicate that the sails of the March events in Kabul were filled with the wind not of individuals, but of a significant number of radically minded parts of Khalq. It was she, led by her influential leaders, who resorted to armed action as a last resort to remove the Parchamite Najibullah, regain power and thus resolve irreconcilable contradictions with her internal party rivals.

Plastun believes that “the speech of Sh. N. Tanaya, despite the tragedy of the situation, became a landmark moment in the life of Najibullah. He began to turn into an increasingly recognized leader of a national scale, with whom increasingly wider sections of the Afghan people began to pin their hopes for the future.”

Continuation of the war. Overthrow

The friendship bequeathed to us by our fathers, illuminated by the genius of Lenin and the insight of Amanullah Khan, became even deeper, even stronger. It grew into a brotherhood of blood, a brotherhood of arms and struggle. It became internationalism in action, it became patriotism in action! ...We will go forward, feeling fraternal support and relying on indestructible patriotic unity. Our friendship with the USSR is eternal!

The withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan began on May 15, 1988, in accordance with the Geneva Agreements on a political settlement of the situation around the DRA concluded in April of the same year. On February 15, 1989, the last Soviet soldier left Afghanistan. With the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan, a difficult situation developed for government agencies and the Afghan army, since the Kabul regime was left alone against the armed opposition. Four days after the withdrawal of Soviet troops, a state of emergency was declared in the country. In order to exercise centralized leadership of the country in a state of emergency, the Supreme Council of Defense of the Motherland was created by presidential decree. Pakistani and American officials expected a quick victory for the Mujahideen. However, within six months these expectations were not met. As a result of the timely supply of weapons and ammunition from the USSR, the Afghan armed forces were able to repel multiple attacks by armed opposition units on Jalalabad, Gardez, Ghazni, Kandahar, Shindand, Faizabad, and Salang. On May 4, 1990, the state of emergency was lifted by presidential decree.

For three years, Najibullah's government managed to stay in power. Shortly after the August events in the USSR in 1991, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the RSFSR Andrei Kozyrev said: “In Afghanistan, everything is ready for a settlement; the only thing that prevents this is the Soviet support of the “extremists” led by Najibullah.” On November 15 of the same year, USSR Foreign Minister Boris Pankin gave official consent to stop military supplies to the Kabul regime. On January 1, 1992, Russia stopped supplying all weapons and ammunition to government forces and, since that time, the situation in Afghanistan began to deteriorate noticeably. The country began to experience an acute shortage of fuel and food, and the opposition, against this background, intensified its propaganda and subversive activities, winning over government military personnel to its side. Mujahideen detachments quickly began to capture one province after another, getting closer and closer to Kabul. Soviet General Lyakhovsky in his book “Tragedy and Valor of Afghanistan” cites an interesting point:

The last seven of our military advisers left Afghanistan on April 13th. As Major General V.V. Lagoshin told me, the night before Najibullah invited him to his place and said that the military advisers urgently needed to leave Afghanistan, since in the very near future power would pass to the opposition, and he himself had only days left as president five. At the same time, he added that although the Soviets were traitors, he considered it his duty to send the military advisers home safe and sound. Indeed, when the administration of the Kabul airfield began to put forward various obstacles regarding the reception and departure of the Soviet plane, Najibullah personally came to the airfield and assisted in sending advisers to Tashkent.

Najibullah lost control of the domestic political situation immediately after he announced his willingness to resign on March 18, 1992 to make way for a neutral interim government. In order to block the path of Hekmatyar’s troops and his attempts to be the first to enter the capital, Najib transferred parts of the 53rd Uzbek division of General Dostum from Mazar-i-Sharif to Kabul. On April 16, Najibullah, on the advice and with the assistance of the special representative of the UN Secretary General B. Sevan, tried to escape from Kabul on a UN plane, but was detained at the call of A. Vakil by Dostum’s Uzbek militias. The President, along with his brother Shapur Ahmadzai, his chief of staff, Tukhi, and his personal security chief, Jafsar, took refuge in the UN mission in Kabul. On April 25, Mujahideen detachments entered Kabul, overthrowing the regime of the PDPA party, which had ruled the country for 14 years.

With the fall of the PDPA regime and Najibullah's departure from the political arena, peace never came in Afghanistan. The civil war in Afghanistan unfolded with even greater ferocity, and the country found itself torn apart by armed confrontation between detachments of Mujahideen field commanders. Against this background, the Najibullah regime began to be assessed by people as more preferable in contrast to the civil strife of the Mujahideen, and therefore it is no coincidence that a new wave of refugees from Kabul left the capital with the words: “Long live Najibullah!”

Execution

Mohammad Najibullah has spent the last four years living in the UN mission without a break. On September 27, 1996, the Taliban captured Kabul. They broke into the UN mission building, where Najibullah and his brother had been staying since his overthrow, and took them both out. According to UN officials, Najibullah was captured at 1:30 a.m. and killed at 4:30 a.m. He was tortured and shot. Having tied the body of the murdered president to a jeep, the Taliban dragged him 2 km to the Ariana intersection, located near the Arg presidential palace. They hung the mutilated and bloodied body of Najibullah and his brother Shahpur Ahmadzai by a steel wire loop from a concrete traffic-control post at the gates of the presidential palace. Taliban commander Noor Hakmal said that "We killed him because he was a killer of our people." The Taliban, also mocking the body of the murdered president and his brother, inserted Afghani bills and cigarettes between their fingers, into their mouths, noses and pockets.

Plastun and Adrianov describe the last minutes of Najibullah’s life differently, pointing out agents of the Pakistani intelligence services as the culprits in his death:

With Najibullah's approval, I. Tuhi and Jafsar, who were with him all these years, left his refuge. They managed to get to India, where they joined Najibullah’s family, who had previously gone there. Only the former head of the 10th Directorate of the MGB, his brother General Ahmadzai, remained with him. Having learned that the former president remained in the capital, Pakistani intelligence services and political circles reacted immediately. Islamabad realized that they had a unique chance in their hands to once and for all resolve all questions about the Afghan-Pakistani border. The plan was simple and did not raise any doubts among its authors.

Mohammad Najibullah with his brother General Shahpur Ahmadzai.

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A group of armed Taliban broke into the UN mission, simultaneously causing a pogrom there, arresting and beating its Afghan citizens. Najibullah and his brother Ahmadzai were captured and transferred to one of the Pakistani intelligence safe houses that had been operating under the Afghan intelligence services since 1992.<…>
General Aslam Bek, well-known in international circles associated with Afghan politics, appeared in Kabul. At one time, he headed the General Staff of the Ground Forces, then held senior positions in Pakistani military intelligence, carrying out the most delicate assignments since the time of the former president of this country, Zia-ul-Haq. He was accompanied by his brother, also a career intelligence officer, and a group of officers. They had with them a document fabricated in the depths of the Pakistani intelligence services on the letterhead of Najibullah's office seized in the presidential palace. The text written on it, dating from Najibullah's time in power, represented an agreement on the official recognition by the President and Government of Afghanistan of the Durand Line as the official and permanent border between that country and Pakistan. This was the main goal of the Pakistani military group - at any cost to force Najibullah to do what no Pashtun would ever do - to sign this “agreement”.

Najibullah was betrayed many times. But in his most terrible hour, he found the strength not to betray either Afghanistan, or his people, or himself. Using his remarkable strength, thanks to which the nickname “Bull” stuck to him from his youth, he managed to disperse the guards, take away a pistol from one of the officers and kill his brother Aslam Bek. What followed was a nightmare. He suffered terrible torture, but was not broken. The terrible execution, which shocked even his enemies, outraged all Afghans, but no matter what side of the barricade they were, drew a line under his life, under the diabolical plan of Islamabad and, by and large, under the political course of Pakistan north of the Durand Line.

(since 1965)