Free Republic

An Iranian Revolutionary Guards general and eight other Iranians have been arrested by Afghan forces and handed over to U.S. authorities, an Afghan politician said Saturday. Izzatullah Wasafi said the officer, whom he identified as a Gen. Razavi, was leading an Iranian group clandestinely distributing money and arms to allies in western Afghanistan when they were seized by Afghan forces last Tuesday. A day later, at a midnight meeting with Wasafi and others, the governor of Kandahar province abruptly decided to hand the men over to the U.S. military when he learned they were Iranians, Wasafi said. A U.S. military...

“What I want to say is that he was never an extremist, neither in his private nor political life. He believed that a modern moderate Islam could work in Afghanistan. He said that the extreme left or right failed in Afghanistan, since both had neglected the needs of the people. Therefore, we could not govern Afghanistan like any traditional Muslim country.” -Ahmad Wali Massoud regarding Ahmed Massoud Shah of the Northern Alliance. In 1996, funded financially and backed morally by their allies in Pakistan, the Taliban (”Students of Islamic Knowledge Movement”) emerged as the prominent force in Afghanistan after the...