Abdul Haq

The veteran Afghan resistance commander Abdul Haq, who has been executed by the Taliban aged 43, was regarded as one of the few homegrown political figures who could have restored unity to his benighted and wartorn country.

His sudden demise not only dashed hopes of an internal revolt against the Taliban regime in Kabul, but also snuffed out hopes of a political revival by the feted anti-Soviet warlord of the 1980s. For when the communist defeat in Afghanistan turned into a frenzy of backbiting and internecine conflict between former mujaheddin allies in 1992, Haq, almost uniquely, emerged with his dignity and reputation intact.

In his heyday, he had proved a devilishly effective commander. He could switch off all Kabul's lights, it was said, by firing a single rocket at crucial electricity pylons. He was a devout Muslim and a proud Pashtun. Above all, he was a patriot who expressed horror that Afghan was still killing Afghan, after more than two decades of war. Haq particularly despised the Taliban for denying their subjects "food and freedom". As he said earlier this month: "Afghan people are beaten and insulted, sick and tired."

At the beginning of the current crisis, he predicted that once the small coterie of Taliban leaders fell, the entire regime would collapse. He had warned his US allies not to bomb, but rather to wage a campaign of psychological pressure. "If they leave things up to us, it will only be a few months [before the Taliban are toppled]," he said. Days before the US launched the first air strikes, he warned that civilian casualties would only steel Pashtun support for the Taliban.

Acting as emissary for the exiled king, Mohammed Zahir Shah, Haq had agreed to sound out potential defectors among the moderate Pashtun. In his view, the largely Uzbek and Tajik Northern Alliance could never defeat the Taliban alone. Even if by some miracle they did, they could not control a traditionally Pashtun-dominated nation. "Neither Pashtuns nor anyone else can rule Afghanistan by the gun. We have seen too many such attempts, and they always lead to more war."

Ultimately, Haq envisioned that a pan-ethnic loya jirga, or consultative assembly, could bring democracy to Afghanistan. He saw his role as facilitator, and denied ambitions for high office. "War is easy. Disagreeing with someone, trying to find a compromise, that's more difficult." But, according to one observer, only Haq, of all the anti-Taliban faction leaders, had presented his exiled monarch with a coherent political programme.

Given Haq's astuteness, his supporters were surprised that he should launch such an under-prepared foray into enemy terrain. What made him act so out of character? How did such a deft operator get caught in a spider's web that he seemed to grasp better than anyone else? Perhaps we shall never know whether his last venture was a peace mission, or the prelude to a revolt.

Some whisper that Haq's 20-strong posse fell victim to a sting operation organised by renegade agents of the Pakistani intelligence services. At least, the Taliban was clear: he was executed as a spy for Britain and the US. The truth, as always with Haq, was more ambiguous.

Certainly, in the mid-1980s, he was treated as a hero in the west, and met Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher. His flawless English and bluff sense of humour proved attractive, and no doubt helped him acquire Stinger missiles from the CIA. Having abandoned the vicious world of post-Soviet Afghan politics, he ran a flourishing import-export business from a house in London during the 1990s. Yet he resented being seen as an American puppet.

Haq was born into an affluent Pashtun clan from Nangrahar province, in south-east Afghanistan. When he left Kabul for Pakistan, his sumptuous white marble mansion, across the border in Peshawar, bespoke his noble origins. Its rooms were built for darshan, or ritualistic encounters between a lord and his followers. As a teenager, he had joined the struggle against communist rule in 1977, and redoubled his efforts when the Soviets invaded in 1979.

At first, he fought for the Hezb-I-Islami (Muslim party) of the warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, though he later joined a faction led by Younis Khalis. A courageous and audacious soldier - he used to fool numerically superior Soviets into thinking they were surrounded - he suffered 12 injuries, including the loss of half a leg, which forced him to trot into battle on pony-back.

When the expected collapse of Afghanistan's communist government did not materialise after the Soviet withdrawal in 1989, mujaheddin fought amongst themselves - notably, Hekmatyar versus the Tajik warlord, Ahmed Shah Masood (obituary, September 17). Haq served as Kabul police chief, and, for a few months in 1992, was a cabinet minister after the mujaheddin eventually took power. His brother, Hajji Qadeer, was a provincial governor between 1992-96. But, before long, disillusion set in. Haq left for Dubai, where he ran a healthy trading business.

In 1998, he became a UN peace mediator. He also designed the Intra-Afghan dialogue process, under the auspices of the former US Congressman Don Ritter and his Afghanistan Foundation. In January 1999, his wife and 11-year-old son were assassinated in Peshawar.

Earlier this year, Haq demanded that the US address the Afghan crisis, but was rebuffed. The assassination of Masood and the atrocities of September 11 changed everything. Briefly, it seemed that the stout, cheery, neatly bearded leader was about to make a dramatic comeback. It was not to be, and not only Afghanistan is the loser.

Haq is survived by his wife Uma, whom he married last year, and five children.

· Abdul Haq (Humayoun Arsala), soldier and politician, born 1958; died October 26 2001

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