Mawlawi Afzal

rdf:langString Mawlawi Afzal

rdf:langString Mawlawi Mohammad Afzal (born c. 1925 – 2012) was a Panjpiri-educated Afghan clergyman of the Kam tribe from , Nuristan Province. He studied in Deoband, and later at , Pakistan, before teaching at a madrassa in Karachi, and then in his native village of . Following the Saur Revolution of 1978 in Afghanistan, Afzal established a Salafist mini-state in northern Nuristan, known as the Islamic Revolutionary State of Afghanistan, with consulates in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. Though Nuristan was generally a mujahideen area, Afzal was among those leaders who were at least temporarily co-opted by the DRA communist government. In the 1980s, Afzal was among those Nuristani leaders who, after initially supporting him, expelled the southern Nuristan military leader , suspecting him of supporting the Communist government. With the arrival of the Taliban in the mid 1990s, Afzal aligned himself with that movement, and received their support.