What the Panshir Valley looks like, the historic Afghan stronghold that resisted the Soviets and now rebels against the Taliban

Over 30 years ago Ahmad Shah Massoud led an armed resistance which prevented the Soviets conquer the Panshir Valley, a rugged and mountainous region 150 kilometers from Kabul. After the withdrawal of the USSR, the taliban They thought they could easily take this stronghold of the so-called Northern Alliance. Corn they also failed.

Massoud, known as the “Lion of Panshir”, became a national hero and was curiously killed two days before the 2001 terrorist attacks while giving an interview to a supposed journalist infiltrated by Al-Qaeda. A bomb hidden in the video camera ended her life.

The area nor could it be dominated by American troops which has withdrawn from the country in recent weeks and only controls Kabul airport. “In contemporary Afghan history, Panshir has never been conquered, neither by foreign forces nor by the Taliban“Summary the journalist of the Afghan service of the BBC Mariam Aman.

And he added: “In the of the last decades was considered the safest region of Afghanistan, as well as a zone of resistance for many Afghans ”.

Today Panshir it is the only one of the 34 provinces from Afghanistan who did not fall under the control of the Taliban and it is once again establishing itself as the last hotbed of resistance against the Sunni fundamentalist militias.

Who is the new commander

“Le Lion du Panshir” died 20 years ago, but his legend lives on. His heritage is kept by his son Ahmad Massoud, which heads a group of fighters led by its National Resistance Front which brings together the remnants of regular Afghan army units and local militiamen.

Massoud’s forces have clashed with the Taliban in recent days in Andarab, a district in the south of Baghlan province near the Panshir valley. The Taliban offensive is violent: their spokespersons announce that they have regained the ground and that they force the rebels to fall back on their stronghold in the middle of the mountains.

But Massoud is not an improviser. He was trained at the Sandhurst British Military Academy and he studied war at King’s College London.

“We are ready to resist the Taliban for the second time,” Panshir economic department chief Abdul Rahman said.

The Panshir valley

The catchment area of ​​Massoud is nestled between cliffs and gorges. It is a real fortress with steep mountains which serve as refuge for the combatants. There the guerrillas wiped out the Soviets and the Taliban at the end of the last century.

The region is crossed by the Panjshir River and is located near the Hindu Kush mountain range, which was once a vital passage for the armies of Alexander the Great. Its economic importance is based on its emerald mines and hydroelectric dams.

In the In recent days, photos of children in the Panshir valley with guns and flags have gone viral of the Northern Alliance ready to resist the Taliban offensive. But the fundamentalist militiamen who took power in Kabul seem to want to seek a way out of arms so as not to repeat the same experience as in the past.

This is why the Taliban are negotiating with the forces of the Northern Alliance “to find a peaceful solutionTaliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said.

The resistance is ready for dialogue, but warns that has “thousands of people” ready to fight, as he said at BBC Ali Nazary, head of external relations for the National Resistance Front.

Afghanistan has lived in constant conflict for decades. And the shadow of the “Lion of Panshir” once again haunts the Taliban.