Haqqani announced the arrest of dozens of ISIS militants and members of the security services in the previous government who were involved in violent and terrorist crimes, he said.
Video duration 01 minutes 18 seconds
Afghan Acting Interior Minister Sirajuddin Haqqani said that the US accusations against him are fabricated, and that his continued placement on the terrorist list does not harm Afghanistan alone, but also the United States and the world.
In his first media appearance – in an interview with Al Jazeera – Haqqani added that not recognizing the government and freezing Afghan funds is a collective punishment for the people, which the Afghan government rejects, calling on the United States to fulfill its obligations in the Doha Agreement.
And Haqqani – who asked to hide his face for reasons he said were security – added, “Of course, there was a stage of fighting, and it is natural that everyone requests to target his enemy, whether on the political or military level, and this stage, thank God, has ended well, and perhaps the United States does not know that I was appointed Minister of the Interior.”
And he continued, “In general, we fought a struggle for 19 or 20 years against them in defense of our homeland and our people, and we performed our duty, and all the sanctions they imposed did not harm our people, praise be to God, and did not affect our morale. Therefore, the harm of all these sanctions is up to the people, and this should not happen.”
In his interview with Al Jazeera, Haqqani revealed the arrest of dozens of ISIS militants and members of the security services in the previous government who were involved in crimes of violence and terrorism, stressing that anyone who commits crimes will be brought to justice, “even if they claim to belong to the Islamic Emirate,” as he described.
The United States accuses Sirajuddin Haqqani of involvement in an attack that killed 6 people, including an American, on a guest house (Serena Hotel) in the Afghan capital Kabul in January 2008, and Washington put him on the wanted list of its security services.
The US government has offered more than $5 million as a reward for information leading to his arrest.
The Americans tried to kill him with air strikes, two of which were carried out in February 2010, one of which resulted in the death of his younger brother, Muhammad Haqqani.
