Taliban Founder Mullah Omar ‘Lived Close to U.S. Bases’

Mullah Mohammad Omar, the founder of the Taliban, had lived in hideout close to a U.S. base in southern Afghanistan until his death, a new book on Omar’s biography has claimed.

According to “The Secret Life of Mullah Omar” written by Bette Dam, a Dutch journalist, and writer, the Taliban leader had never hidden in Pakistan as believed by the U.S.

Omar had lived in hiding only three miles away from a U.S. Base in Zabul province, Dam’s research indicates.

Bette Dam has been reporting from Afghanistan since 2006. She has worked on the biography of Mullah Omar for more than five years and a summary of her findings was published by the Guardian and the Wall Street Journal last month.

Ms. Dam had interviewed a number of Taliban leaders including Jabbar Omari who served Mullah Omar as a bodyguard after their regime collapsed in 2001.

Omari told Dam that he hid the Taliban leader until his death from illness in 2013.

This comes as a $10m bounty on Omar’s head was put after the 9/11 attacks in the U.S but the American forces failed to find his hiding place.

Meanwhile, the Afghan government on Monday rejected a report, “We strongly reject this delusional claim and we see it as an effort to create and build an identity for the Taliban and their foreign backers,” President Ghani’s Spokesman Haroon Chakhansuri tweeted on Monday.

“We have sufficient evidence which shows he (Mullah Omar) lived & died in Pakistan,” he added.