The agent who never confessed to his crime but took revenge.
Source: Guzorishnomai Afghoniston website
From the book by American journalist Steve Coll, “Ghost War”:
In early 1994, Mohammad Qasim Fahim, Ahmad Shah Massoud’s chief of security, received a message that Hamid Karzai was cooperating with Pakistani intelligence (ISI). Fahim triggered a chain of strange events that eventually led to Karzai and his family getting closer to the Taliban.
Like most of Massoud’s trusted commanders, Fahim was a Tajik from the Panjshir Valley. Before 1994, many Kabul Pashtuns considered the Panjshiris a military mafia. The group, which had fought for more than a decade under the charismatic leadership of Ahmad Shah Massoud, was strong, stubborn, secretive, and effectively a government within the government. The Kabul cabinet was ostensibly multi-ethnic, but as the civil war worsened, the Panjshiri-controlled defense ministries and intelligence directorates became increasingly powerful. As a result, relations with the Pashtun leaders deteriorated sharply.
One reason for this rift was the unfinished war with Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. Massoud considered him an incorrigible henchman of Pakistani intelligence (ISI), and was always worried about behind-the-scenes plots by Pakistan-backed Pashtun leaders. In these circumstances, where war, violence, and repeated betrayals had created deep mistrust among the groups involved, disinformation and war rumors influenced the leaders’ decisions.
After receiving information about Karzai’s plot against the government, Fahim sent intelligence officers to Karzai’s compound in Kabul. They arrested him and took him to an interrogation center near the presidential palace. He was interrogated for several hours and accused of collaborating with Pakistan.
Karzai never directly spoke about what happened to him while in custody. However, several people who met him later said that he was beaten and that his face was bloody and bruised. Some sources even indicate that Mohammad Fahim was personally present during the interrogation. It is unclear whether Ahmad Shah Massoud knew about the arrest or approved of it - his commanders deny this claim.
Karzai's interrogation ended with an unexpected incident: one of Hekmatyar's rockets, usually fired at central Kabul, hit the same intelligence building where Karzai was being held. In the chaos caused by the explosion, Karzai left the building and disappeared into the streets of Kabul.
He went to the city's bus station and quietly boarded a bus bound for Jalalabad. There, a UN friend recognized him on the street and noticed that his face was bruised and scarred. The friend took him to a relative’s house. The next day, Karzai crossed into Pakistan through the Khyber Pass. He did not return to Kabul for more than seven years.
In the spring of 1994, Karzai joined his father in Quetta. A few months later, he learned of the rise of the Taliban. He knew many of the Taliban’s leaders from the anti-Soviet jihad. “They were my friends… They were good people,” he later said.
The Taliban was Karzai’s chance to exact revenge on the government that had driven him into exile.
Although Karzai was not rich by Western standards, he donated about $50,000 of his fortune to the Taliban to help them organize around Kandahar. He also donated a large number of his weapons and introduced the Taliban to prominent Pashtun tribal leaders.
