The suicide bombers’ units have been disbanded in Afghanistan, and their personnel have been integrated into the special forces command of the Taliban* army, conveyed Fasihuddin Fitrat, the Taliban’s Chief of Staff, as per Afghan media reports on Wednesday.
Fitrat emphasized that these units, originally trained for the occupation period, are now deemed unnecessary.
"These battalions have been dissolved and practically do not exist," he said, cautioning, however, that if Afghanistan encounters another act of aggression or invasion, the entire force of the group would resort to conducting suicide attacks against the invaders.
When the Taliban seized power in Kabul in August 2021, they introduced a new unit known as "Lashkar Mansoori Suicide Bombers Battalions" to safeguard the northeastern provinces' borders. In December 2022, the group memorialized its suicide attackers by displaying a list of names on the wall of the "Hamza Suicide Bombers Battalion" in Kabul.
Mullah Tajmir Jawad, the Deputy Director of Taliban Intelligence, reportedly played a key role in establishing the "Hamza Suicide Bombers Battalion.”
Throughout the Taliban's conflict with the previous government's security forces and foreign troops, they conducted numerous suicide attacks on both civilian and military targets.
The impact of suicide attacks during the US occupation of Afghanistan was severe: as per human rights organizations, it led to the tragic loss of tens of thousands of civilian lives.
In a speech at a gathering in Kandahar in February 2022, Sirajuddin Haqqani, the Taliban's Minister of Interior, revealed that 1,050 members of the Haqqani network had carried out suicide attacks in the preceding decade and a half.
* under UN sanctions for terrorism