Afghan spy chief quits over ‘differences’ with Ashraf Ghani

Rahmatullah Nabil disapproved of decision to restart talks with Taliban

ISLAMABAD: Afghanistan’s spymaster stepped down from his post on Thursday after developing differences with President Ashraf Ghani over the latter’s move to attend a regional conference in Islamabad.

“President Ghani has accepted the resignation of Rahmatullah Nabil as director of the National Directorate of Security (NDS),” deputy presidential spokesman Sayed Zafar Hashmi posted on Twitter.

“He [Ghani] is holding a special meeting to pick a caretaker chief of NDS from the organisation’s leadership,” he said.

In his resignation letter, Nabil said he had developed differences with the Afghan government over some of its policies. He also said that some conditions had been imposed on him which had restricted his work.

However, in a strongly worded post on Facebook which appeared a day earlier, the now former NDS chief criticised both Pakistan and Ghani’s decision to visit the country. He also accused Pakistan of supporting the Taliban offensive in Kunduz in the Dari-language post.

Nabil, who had spent time in Pakistan as a refugee and had studied in Peshawar, was also said to be upset at reports that the government of Afghanistan could resume negotiations with the Taliban soon. He reportedly opposed Kabul’s move to sign an agreement on cooperation between the intelligence agencies of Afghanistan and Pakistan as well.

In his statement, Nabil said President Ghani had verbally asked him to relinquish charge of the NDS.

But Ghani issued a statement, saying that he had not wanted Nabil to quit due to the difficult security situation in Afghanistan. He added that he, however, respected Nabil’s decision.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 11^th, 2015.