Underground intelligence operatives helped Taliban seize Kabul: Report

A newly published report in the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) on Sunday explained how the Taliban's agents have been present in ministries, universities, business entities, and aid organizations.

This comes as Ashraf Ghani's government fell to the Taliban after the collapse of Kabul without any gunfire on August 15 as the former President Mohammad Ashraf Ghani fled without any early notice.

The lightning fall of United States trained Afghan soldiers in August and in the preceding months had raised several questions.

According to WSJ, the Taliban had agents in every organization and department who had already taken the control of strategic locations before they enter Kabul. The information was revealed by Mawlawi Mohammad Salim Saad, a key Taliban leader loyal to Haqqani Network.

The WSJ report said Taliban's men were tasked on August 15 to take out their guns from hiding and conduct special operations in disarming security forces and taking the control of the strategic locations in Kabul.

Mohammad Rahim Omari, a mid-level commander in the Badri force, was working undercover at a gasoline-trading business in the capital city before he was called into action on August 15.

The WSJ quoted Omari as saying that several Taliban members were dispatched to an Afghan intelligence service compound in the east of the city, where they disarmed the officers on duty and stopped them from destroying computers and files.

Bilal Sarwary, a prominent Afghan journalist said Two Taliban operatives working at the state bank posed as an ordinary Afghan and lived with his family for years in Taymani in Central Afghanistan.

"Two Taliban operatives were at AIB bank in Share Naw for few years! @yarotrof My neighbour who posed as an ordinary Afghan and lived with his family for years in Taymani was indeed a key Taliban intel operative. He was a good and a polite neighbour until the end," Sarwary tweeted. (ANI)