Afghans Investigate Murder of Vice President

Afghan President Hamid Karzai asked for assistance from the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in the wake of the assassination Saturday of Afghan Vice President Haji Abdul Qadir. Two unknown assailants opened fire on Qadir’s car in broad daylight as he left his office in Kabul after his first day on the job as vice president and public works minister.

The hail of gunfire left both Qadir and his son-in-law dead while the assailants sped away in a waiting taxi. Police have arrested 12 people in connection with the incident but none are believed to have had direct involvement with the shooting.

Qadir was an influential warlord as well as one of the few ethnic Pashtuns belonging to the Northern Alliance, which helped push the Taliban regime from power last year. Despite reportedly developing enemies during his many years on the Afghan political scene, Qadir was considered a pivotal part of the Karzai administration’s effort to build alliances between the capital and tribes in the eastern part of the country.

The fallen vice president was given a full state funeral in Kabul Sunday and buried outside a mosque in Jalalabad, as some 10,000 Afghans publicly mourned.

Qadir’s assassination comes five months after the murder of Civil Aviation and Tourism Minister Abdul Rehman at the Kabul airport. The circumstances of Rehman’s death remain unclear and no one has been formally charged with his murder.

According to regional experts, the loss of two cabinet members has cast doubt on the stability of the Karzai administration, which was formally recognized during last month’s loya jirga, or traditional grand council.

Karzai spokesman Sayed Fazl Akbar told Reuters Monday that the government had asked the ISAF to help in an effort to ensure “a completely neutral, fair, quick and professional investigation” into the murders.

The commander of the 19-nation peacekeeping force, Turkish Maj. Gen. Hilmi Akin Zorlu, said a joint task force would be created that would include members of the ISAF and the Afghan ministries of justice and the interior.

“It is vital to bring the perpetrators of this crime to justice as soon as possible and ISAF will donate every resource required to achieve it,” Zorlu said in a statement.

The Afghan administration has not named a successor for Qadir as of yet, but hopes to do so in the next few days.