Burhanuddin Rabbani

Burhanuddin Rabbani
برهان‌الدین ربانی
Rabbani in 2010
6th President of Afghanistan
In office 28 June 1992 – 22 December 2001 Disputed by Mullah Omar (as Supreme Leader) from 27 September 1996 – 13 November 2001
Prime Minister	Abdul Sabur Farid Kohistani Gulbuddin Hekmatyar Arsala Rahmani (acting) Ahmad Shah Ahmadzai (acting) Abdul Rahim Ghafoorzai
Vice President	Abdul Rasul Sayyaf Sayed Mansur Naderi, son of Sayed Kayan Mohammad Shah Fazli Mohammad Nabi Mohammadi
Preceded by	Mohammad Najibullah
Succeeded by	Hamid Karzai
Personal details
Born	(1940-09-20)20 September 1940 Badakhshan, Afghanistan
Died	20 September 2011(2011-09-20) (aged 71) Kabul, Afghanistan
Political party	Jamiat-e Islami (Founder)
Children	4, including Salahuddin
Education	Kabul University (BA) Al-Azhar University (MA, PhD)
Occupation	Politician, teacher, Mujahideen leader
Awards	Tajikistan : Order of Ismoili Somoni – posthumously awarded on 2 September 2014[1]  Cuba : Order of José Marti – posthumously awarded on 15 August 2021

Burhānuddīn Rabbānī (Persian: برهان‌الدین ربانی; 20 September 1940 – 20 September 2011) was an Afghan politician and teacher who served as president of Afghanistan from 1992 to 1996, and again from November to December 2001 (in exile from 1996 to 2001).

Born in the Badakhshan Province, Rabbani studied at Kabul University and worked there as a professor of Islamic theology. He formed the Jamiat-e Islami (Islamic Society) at the university which attracted then-students Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and Ahmad Shah Massoud, both would eventually become the two leading commanders of the Afghan mujahideen in the Soviet–Afghan War from 1979. Rabbani was chosen to be the President of Afghanistan after the end of the former communist regime in 1992. Rabbani and his Islamic State of Afghanistan government was later forced into exile by the Taliban, and he then served as the political head of the Northern Alliance, an alliance of various political groups who fought against the Taliban regime in Afghanistan. During his time in the office, there were a lot of internal clashes between different fighting groups.

After the Taliban government was toppled during Operation Enduring Freedom, Rabbani returned to Kabul and served briefly as president from 13 November to 22 December 2001, when Hamid Karzai was chosen as his succeeding interim leader at the Bonn International Conference.^[2] In later years he became head of Afghanistan National Front (known in the media as United National Front), the largest political opposition to Karzai's government.

On 20 September 2011, Rabbani was assassinated by a suicide bomber entering his home in Kabul. As suggested by the Afghan parliament, Afghanistan's President Hamid Karzai gave him the title of "Martyr of Peace".^[3] His son Salahuddin Rabbani was chosen in April 2012 to lead efforts to forge peace in Afghanistan with the Taliban.^[4]