Word: zahir
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Before the attendees even settled in their seats, host Pir Sayed Ahmed Gailani, a spiritual leader who has positioned himself close to deposed King Zahir Shah, sought backing for his plan to set up an interim supreme council headed by the former monarch. Under Gailani's plan, after the Taliban fell, a council chaired by the King would assume power, backed by a U.N. security force from Muslim countries. The council would call a loya jirga, the traditional representative political gathering, to write a constitution acceptable to all ethnic groups within the framework of Islamic law. Speaker after speaker embraced...
...1900s, when King Mohammed Zahir Shah ruled Afghanistan, wealthy women strolled Kabul's streets in jeans and Western dresses. The Soviets, although brutal in their occupation of the country, maintained women's rights during their decade-long rule. But when the Islam-inspired mujahedin government took over in 1992, life began to change. Women still could attend university, especially to study in the medical and educational fields, but many started wearing head scarves to appease the mullahs. When the Taliban came to power in 1996, its fanatical clerics erased all remaining rights: women are forbidden to leave the house without...
...currying favor himself, furiously networking, Afghan-style. On Sept. 15, he dispatched an envoy to the newly arrived U.S. ambassador in Pakistan, Wendy Chamberlin, in hopes of gaining American backing. And last month he sent an envoy to Rome to pay respects to the aged, deposed Afghan King, Mohammed Zahir Shah, whom the U.S. has tapped as a symbolic rallying figure for post-Taliban Afghanistan. But if Shirzai is following the age-old Afghan custom of building bridges, he is also following its equally venerable tradition of nursing grudges. His clan is part of the Pashtun ethnic group, which, with...
...comes? "There's not a specific plan," admits a State Department spokesman. However, in the back rooms of the world's capitals, an outline is beginning to emerge. The U.N. helped persuade the ousted King to convene a grand assembly, traditionally known as a loya jirga. Three weeks ago, Zahir, who has broad support among his fellow Pashtun, met with representatives of the Northern Alliance in Rome and made a deal under which together they would appoint a council of 120 representatives to select as many as 1,000 tribal elders and respected Afghans for the loya jirga. That group...
...Supplies are a major problem. Sitting in a shell-pocked command post with a panoramic view of the Kapisa front lines, Mahmad Zahir, a platoon commander with 21 years of combat experience, pulls out three Kalashnikov rifle magazines from the webbing under his jacket and lays them on the floor for inspection. Two of the three are empty. "We're short of ammunition?for tanks, artillery, machine guns, rifles. It's already cold, but we don't have enough blankets, and we have no winter uniforms," says the bearded, sunken-cheeked veteran. "If the Americans hit the Taliban...