Khairullah Khairkhwa

Khairullah Khairkhwa
In this identity portrait Khairullah Khairkhwa wears the tan uniform issued to compliant captives while detained at Guantanamo Bay.
Minister of the Interior
In office 1997–1998
Personal details
Born	1967 Kandahar, Afghanistan
Political party	Taliban
Religion	Islam (Deobandi)[1]
Military service
Allegiance	Taliban
Years of service	1994-2001
Battles/wars	Afghan civil war War in Afghanistan

Khirullah Said Wali Khairkhwa is a Taliban official and former governor of Herat. He was held in the United States Guantanamo Bay detainment camp in Cuba.^[2] He was released in late May 2014 in a prisoner exchange that involved Bowe Bergdahl and the Taliban five.^[3] Press reports have referred to him as "Mullah" and "Maulavi", two different honorifics for referring to senior Muslim clerics.^{[4][5][6][7][8]}

Claims from analysts at Guantanamo that Khairkhwa was directly associated with Osama Bin Laden and Taliban Supreme Commander Mullah Muhammad Omar have been widely repeated.^[9] Kate Clark has criticized her fellow journalists for uncritically repeating US claims that were largely based on unsubstantiated rumor and innuendo, or on confessions and denunciations coerced through torture and other extreme interrogation techniques.^[10]

Early life

American intelligence analysts estimate that Khairkhwa was born in 1967 in Kandahar, Afghanistan. He is a Popalzai from Arghestan in Kandahar province.^[11] He studied religious topics at the Haqqaniya and Akhora Khattak madrassas in Pakistan, together with other influential Taliban leaders.^[11]

He held various government posts, both before the Taliban took over Afghanistan, including a police official in Kabul, and finally, Governor of Herat Province.^[4][12]

Khirullah was one of the original Taliban members who launched the movement in 1994.^[11]

Khairullah Khairkhwah was the Minister of the Interior under Taliban rule in 1997 and 1998. The Deputy Minister was Mohammed Khaksar.^[13]

Some reports have said he had been the Taliban's deputy minister of the interior, interim minister of the interior, the minister of the interior, and the Minister of Information.^[5][7] Khirullah was also to serve as the Taliban's Minister of Foreign Affairs spokesman, giving interviews to the British Broadcasting Corporation and the Voice of America.

Khirullah Khairkhwa arrived at Guantanamo on May 1, 2002, and has been held there for 13 years, 7 months and 25 days.^[14][15][16]

In early 2011 president Hamid Karzai demanded his release and Hekmat Karzai, the director of the Centre for Conflict and Peace Studies in Kabul said "His release will be influential to the peace process," and that "Mr Khairkhwa is well respected amongst the Taliban and was considered a moderate by those who knew him".^[17][18]

September 2000 BBC interview

Kate Clark, then of the BBC News, interviewed Khairkhwa in September 2000.^[10] Clark wrote that Khairkhwa was comfortable conversing in the Dari language, when most Taliban leaders, all members of Afghanistan's Pashtun ethnic group, would only speak in the Pashtun language. She wrote that, under Khairkhwa, she was allowed to film openly in Herat, even though doing so was disallowed under Taliban law. She wrote that, under Khairkhwa, Afghan women felt comfortable approaching her, and speaking with her, something that never happened in other regions of Afghanistan.

Joint Review Task Force

When he assumed office in January 2009 President Barack Obama made a number of promises about the future of Guantanamo.^[19][20][21] He promised the use of torture would cease at the camp. He promised to institute a new review system. That new review system was composed of officials from six departments, where the OARDEC reviews were conducted entirely by the Department of Defense. When it reported back, a year later, the Joint Review Task Force classified some individuals as too dangerous to be transferred from Guantanamo, even though there was no evidence to justify laying charges against them. On April 9, 2013, that document was made public after a Freedom of Information Act request.^[22] Khairullah Khairkhwa was one of the 71 individuals deemed too innocent to charge, but too dangerous to release. Although Obama promised that those deemed too innocent to charge, but too dangerous to release would start to receive reviews from a Periodic Review Board less than a quarter of men have received a review.

Release negotiations

The Afghanistan High Peace Council called for his release in 2011.^[23]

Throughout the fall of 2011 and the winter of 2012 the United States conducted peace negotiations with the Taliban, and widely leaked was that a key sticking point was the ongoing detention of Khairkhwa and four other senior Taliban, Norullah Noori, Mohammed Fazl, Abdul Haq Wasiq.^{[24][25][26][27]} Negotiations hinged on a proposal to send the five men directly to Doha, Qatar, where they would be allowed to set up an official office for the Taliban.

In March 2012 it was reported that Ibrahim Spinzada, described as "Karzai's top aide" had spoken with the five men, in Guantanamo, earlier that month, and had secured their agreement to be transferred to Qatar.^[27] It was reported that Karzai, who had initially opposed the transfer, now backed the plan. It was reported that US officials stated the Obama administration had not yet agreed to transfer the five men.

Release

Khairkhwa and the other four members of the Taliban five were flown to Qatar and released on June 1, 2014. Simultaneously U.S. soldier Bowe Bergdahl was released in eastern Afghanistan. Khairkhwa was required to spend the next year in Qatar, a condition of his and the other Taliban members, release.^[28]

References

External links

• Who Are the Remaining Prisoners in Guantánamo? Part Five: Captured in Pakistan Andy Worthington, September 29, 2010