The invisible “supreme leader” of the Taliban, Mullah Hibatullah Akhundzada, whose public appearance had never been made official since his appointment in 2016, took part in a ceremony on Saturday evening in Kandahar (southern Afghanistan), Taliban officials said.
“The Commander of the Believers, Sheikh Hibatullah Akhundzada, made an appearance at a large gathering at the famous Hakimiya madrassa and spoke for ten minutes to the valiant soldiers and disciples,” the Taliban government said in a message on Sunday. audio in support.
In this distributed audio clip, the mullah can be heard very indistinctly reciting prayers and blessings.
According to a local source, Mullah Hibatullah Akhundzada arrived at this Koranic school in Kandahar with a convoy of two cars under very high security and no photographs were allowed.
After being silent for a long time on his whereabouts, the Taliban announced in September that Hibatullah Akhundzada had lived “from the start” in Kandahar and that he would appear “soon in public”.
Until he succeeded Mansour in 2016 who was killed in an American drone strike in Pakistan, Mr. Akhundzada was relatively unknown, more involved in judicial and religious matters than in military maneuvers.
After coming to power, Mullah Akhundzada quickly won the loyalty of the Egyptian Ayman al-Zawahiri, the leader of al-Qaeda, who called him an “emir of the believers”, thus bolstering his credibility in the world. jihadist and Sunni universe.
In his function of “supreme leader”, Mr. Akhundzada is responsible for maintaining unity within the Islamist movement, a complex mission as the internal struggles which have fractured the jihadist movement for years persist since their return to power in mid-August. .