Afghanistan Moving To Civil War As Vice President Declares Himself New Leader (Video)

By Stefan J. Bos, Chief International Correspondent Worthy News

(Worthy News) – Afghanistan was moving closer to civil war Wednesday after its former First Vice President Amrullah Saleh declared himself the country’s new leader and, backed by a resistance movement, vowed not to surrender to the ruling Islamist Taliban group.

“I won’t disappoint millions who listened to me. I will never be under one ceiling with the Taliban. Never,” Saleh declared on social media.

His comments came after President Ashraf Ghani fled the country as Taliban insurgents took the capital Kabul over the weekend, prompting the collapse of the government.

Saleh had retreated Wednesday to Afghanistan’s last remaining holdout: the Panjshir Valley northeast of Kabul. Pictures emerged of Saleh with the son of his former mentor and late anti-Taliban fighter Ahmed Shah Massoud in Panjshir.

Saleh and Massoud’s son, who commands a militia force, appeared to be putting together a guerilla movement to take on the victorious Taliban. Fighters reportedly regrouped in mountainous Panjshir to prepare for guerilla warfare.

Saleh made clear he saw it as his duty to fight saying he would “never betray” Ahmad Shah Massoud, the leader of the Northern Alliance.

Massoud was assassinated by two operatives of the terror group al-Qaida.

The killing happened just before the September 11th terror attacks on the United States that took place in 2001, for which al-Qaida claimed responsibility.

CIVIL WAR?

Amid the latest standoff, Michael Flynn, the former national security adviser of ex-President Donald J. Trump, warned of a civil war breaking out in Afghanistan.

Speaking to the Just the News publication, he suggested the possibility that the north would be controlled by an anti-Taliban resistance movement supporting Saleh and the south by the Taliban. “There are some capable forces in Afghanistan. And they’re primarily the special operations forces that have been trained, and they’re very good,” Flynn stressed.

“And I know some of these guys, and I know that I certainly know their commanders. So I know that they’re fighting today,” he said.

Flynn added, “they’ve actually taken a few losses, but they will … stay in the country.” He said Afghanistan “will likely bifurcate, meaning it’ll split, kind of along the lines of that it used to be, you know, where you have the sort of the north-south divide.”

Tensions also emerged elsewhere in Afghanistan Wednesday with reports of Taliban fighters shooting at anti-Taliban protestors, killing three people and some 12 others.

The shootings in the eastern city of Jalalabad, about 115 kilometers (71 miles) east of Kabul, came despite claims by
the Taliban leadership that it would not attack innocent civilians or seek revenge.

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