New Delhi: Dr Amin al-Haq, a top al Qaeda player who spent years serving as Osama bin Laden’s security coordinator, is believed to have returned to his native Nangarhar province in Afghanistan following the fall of Kabul, videos that emerged Tuesday purportedly show.
According to American news website FDD’s Long War Journal, al-Haq, also known as Muhammad Amin, could be seen accompanied by a large convoy of heavily armed Taliban fighters and was greeted by a cheering crowd that wanted to take selfies with him.
A trained medical doctor, described by the LA Times as a “urologist”, al-Haq was the security coordinator of the Black Guard, the elite unit responsible for protecting bin Laden. He was also referred to as bin Laden’s bodyguard.
Dr. Amin-ul-Haq, a major al-Qaeda player in Afghanistan, Osama Bin Laden security in charge in Tora Bora, returns to his native Nangarhar province after it fell to the Taliban. Dr. Amin became close to OBL in the 80s when he worked with Abdullah Azzam in Maktaba Akhidmat. pic.twitter.com/IXbZeJ0nZE
— BILAL SARWARY (@bsarwary) August 30, 2021
The Bush administration froze al-Haq’s assets after the 9/11 attacks in 2001. He was one of 39 designated individuals and organisations with suspected terrorist ties. He also faced sanctions from the United Nations for participating in the financing, planning, facilitating, preparing or perpetrating of acts or activities in support of Osama bin Laden and the al Qaeda as well as supplying, selling or transferring arms and related material to support terror activities.
According to the official Interpol website, al-Haq was born in 1960 in Nangarhar and his family name is Saam Khan. He is currently 61 years old.
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Helping bin Laden escape Operation Anaconda
Al-Haq allegedly helped bin Laden escape the US-led Operation Anaconda in 2002, by moving him out of Tora Bora in eastern Afghanistan to Waziristan in Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
The Tora Bora cave complex, high up in the mountains, was where the senior al Qaeda leadership was holed up at the time. Operation Anaconda, which lasted from 2-18 March 2002, was aimed at destroying or capturing al Qaeda and Taliban forces in these mountain positions located in the Shahi-Kot Valley and Arma Mountains near Afghanistan’s Zurmat.
Al Haq’s role in helping bin Laden escape was described in former Pakistan president, General Pervez Musharraf’s memoir ‘In the Line of Fire’, based on information from Khalid Sheikh Muhammad (KSM), the third-highest ranking member of the al Qaeda.
KSM also named Jalaluddin Haqqani, founder of the terror group Haqqani Network who died in 2018, as part of this escape operation.
However, a 2008 research paper published in Taylor & Francis journal notes that none of the US’s high value detainees were able to corroborate this account.
Al-Haq fought Soviet forces during the 1980s in Afghanistan, according to a 2011 report in British newspaper The Telegraph. He was also part of the Afghan delegation that travelled to Sudan in 1996 to bring bin Laden to Afghanistan.
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Pakistan arrest al-Haq in 2008, releases him in 2011
In 2008, al-Haq, who was about 48 years at the time, was arrested in Lahore during a special operation by Pakistan’s intelligence and law enforcement agencies. At the time, he was the second top al Qaeda operative to be seized by Pakistani authorities. The first was Mohammed Rahim, who allegedly worked as bin Laden’s driver in Afghanistan.
Al-Haq was held in a prison in a north-western Pakistani town of Peshawar.
In 2011, Pakistan controversially freed him, citing insufficient evidence.
“Amin al-Haq had been arrested mistakenly, therefore, the police failed to prove any charge of his association with Osama bin Laden and the court set him free,” The Telegraph report quoted a senior security source as saying.
The newspaper further noted: “Pakistan has a poor track record of convicting terrorists, blamed in part on an ill-equipped police force and an overstretched judicial service. However, critics accuse elements of the security services of turning a blind eye to extremist groups.”
At the time, two senior Pakistani police officials had told US news channel CBS that al-Haq was not a “key player” and “had no information of great value”.
“Eventually there was nothing that could be used to keep holding him in custody,” said one of the officials.
(Edited by Manasa Mohan)
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