Taliban step up security ahead of supreme leader’s Kandahar mosque visit on Eid

The Taliban are stepping up security after it emerged that Isis could attack its reclusive supreme leader during his expected visit to a Kandahar mosque for Eid prayers, local media reports said.

Hibatullah Akhundzada is an Islamic scholar who almost never appears in public. He rarely leaves the Taliban heartland in southern Afghanistan’s Kandahar province.He and his circle have been instrumental in imposing restrictions on women and girls that have sparked an international outcry and isolated the Taliban on the global stage.

Photos and videos from Kandahar on Sunday showed Taliban fighters transporting and laying a brick barrier around a mosque ahead of Eid al-Fitr holiday, which marks the end of the fasting month of Ramadan.

Reports had emerged on Friday that Isis, which is opposed to the Taliban, was mulling an attack on the Afghan regime’s leaders.

The local Taliban administration decided to pick the prayer venue for Mr Akhundzada just a night before the occasion, Afghanistan International reported, adding that they feared Isis fighters could mingle with the local worshippers to gain entry into the mosque.

They have since finalised two mosques in Kandahar and are now scaling up security measures around both, the report added.

The Independent has not verified the authenticity of the visuals from Kandahar.

On Saturday, Mr Akhundzada released a written Eid message urging Taliban officials to set aside their differences to serve Afghanistan.

Taliban officials should “live a brotherly life among themselves, avoid disagreements and selfishness”, he added in a message distributed in seven languages including Uzbek and Turkmen.

Mr Akhundzada also mentioned diplomatic relations, Afghanistan’s economy, the Taliban’s justice system, charity, and the virtues of meritocracy in his message.

He said security did not come from “being tough and killing more; rather, security is aligned with Shariah and justice”.

He, however, did not speak about the ban on education for girls and women in Afghanistan.

Human rights groups have accused the Taliban’s hardline regime of gender apartheid in their second rule, which started after the US and Nato forces pulled out of the country in August 2021.

The group has since erased the presence of girls and women from the public by banning them from work, schools, education, public parks, gyms and national parks.

Mr Akhundzada said his regime does not marry off women and widows by force – a claim countered by women activists witnessing the crimes on the ground in Afghanistan.