End of an era: Karzai’s senior deputy and ex-warlord dead at 57

Marshal Mohammad Qasim Fahim died from complications caused by diabetes and heart problems.

KABUL: Afghan Vice President Marshal Mohammad Qasim Fahim, formerly one of the country’s most feared warlords, died of natural causes on Sunday after a turbulent life that reflected the country’s recent past. He was 57 years old.

“With extreme sorrow, Marshal Mohammad Qasim Fahim, the first vice president of Afghanistan, passed away due to an illness,” the presidential palace said in a statement.

It said President Karzai expressed his deep condolences over the ‘uncompensable loss’ of ‘a patriot and a great mujahid’.

Three days of national mourning will begin on Monday, with the national flag flying at half-mast across the country in the middle of election campaigning before polling day on April 5.

Fahim, a leader of the Tajik ethnic minority, was senior vice-president under President Hamid Karzai, who will step down at elections next month as US-led combat forces pull out of Afghanistan after 13 years of fighting the Taliban.

Aged 56, Fahim was accused of being a ruthless strongman, who maintained his own militia forces, but he also received American support as Afghanistan struggled for stability following the fall of the Taliban regime in 2001.

Fahim served as an influential but brutal intelligence officer under iconic rebel commander Ahmad Shah Massoud, fighting against the Soviet occupation in 1980s and against the Taliban’s 1996-2001 regime.

With strong backing from Washington, Fahim was appointed to the key position of defence minister in 2002, where he was criticised for appointing mainly Tajik senior officers and failing to build a representative national army.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 10^th, 2014.