A year after the assassination of a popular Kandahar police chief, Gen. Abdul Raziq Achakzai, Afghans want the government to finally break the silence on the probe and reveal who was behind the attack
KABUL (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 18th October, 2019) A year after the assassination of a popular Kandahar police chief, Gen. Abdul Raziq Achakzai, Afghans want the government to finally break the silence on the probe and reveal who was behind the attack.
Gen. Raziq, a popular public figure and longtime Taliban enemy, was killed on October 18, 2018. He was shot dead by a guard as he left the Kandahar governor palace next to US Gen. Austin Scott Miller.
Though the Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack, the high-profile assassination did give rise to a number of theories. People also questioned how the US general escaped unhurt in the attack, which also killed the provincial intelligence chief.
A year after the attack, Tadin Khan Achakzai, who has taken over as provincial police chief after his brother, continues the manhunt for those linked to the murder.
"I am a government; I am following my brother's killers; three have been killed and two others are still alive. I cannot breathe comfortably until my brother's killers are dead," Tadin Khan told Sputnik.
According to Taddin Khan, his brother was a target of multiple attacks - over 30 small and large assaults during his life.
Former National Directorate of Security Director Rahmatullah Nabil, in turn, described the government's silence on the probe into Raziq's death as questionable.
"The government has not yet responded to the public in relation to the terror [attack] against Gen. Raziq. The commission appointed in connection with General Raziq's terror has collected their information, but as this issue is an intelligence, some information is not shared but some had to be shared so that people's questions were solved," Nabil told Sputnik.
According to Nabil, the terrorist attack was masterminded by Mullah Shireen, a leader of the Taliban's Quetta council in Pakistan's Balochistan province.
"The young man who attacked Raziq was trained in Pakistan. The internal circles and the Pakistani intelligence service ISI jointly worked on him," he claimed.
The Afghan authorities are, meanwhile, yet to publish the results of the investigation.
"General Raziq's terror plan was planned outside the country. Within a year, a number of people have been arrested in connection with this case and the case is still under investigation," an Interior Ministry spokesperson told reporters.
A large meeting is scheduled for Friday in the Kabul Loya Jirga hall where information on the probe is to be released.
