Vice President Ahmad Zia Masood of Afghanistan
PESHAWAR - Late Ahmad Shah Masood's younger brother Ahmad Zia Masood is likely to emerge as one of the leading challengers to President Hamid Karzai in Afghanistan's forthcoming presidential elections.
Apparently, Zia Masood had intercepted the money on the way to Panjsher by keeping it for himself.
Abdullah Abdullah, Zia Masood was Karzais third choice to fill the vice presidential post.
Among those trying to dissuade Zia Masood was another brother, Ahmad Vali Masood, the source indicated.
Experts in Kabul say Zia Masood is heavily influenced by Burhanuddin Rabbani, who served as Afghanistans de facto president prior to the rise of the Taliban, and who is also the vice presidential candidates father-in-law.
Zia Masood was born in Ghazni on May 1, 1956.
On September 9, 2001 Ahmad Shah Masood was slain by an attack perpetrated by Al-Qaeda.
Three years after the attacks on 9-11, Ahmad Shah Masood is still considered a political icon in the middle east.
province for a campaign rally, little did he know, he would be the target of an assassination attempt.
Ahmad Zia Masood was able to escape this morning's assassination plot.
Masood is a brother of Ahmad Shah Masood, the legendary guerrilla commander who fought the Soviets and the Taliban before being assassinated in a suspected al Qaeda attack days before the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.
Ahmad Zia Masood said Britain and the United States had spent hundreds of millions of dollars to combat growing of opium poppie More.
Masood was killed by Al Qaeda suicide bombers two days before the Sept.
Masood was credited with playing a key role in defeating Afghanistans Soviet occupation.
Although Zia Masood is himself a Tajik, a majority of Tajik leaders appear to feel that Fahim, who had served simultaneously as vice president and defense minister, was wronged.
Masood is a brother of the Ahmad Shah Masood, the legendary resistance fighter in northern Afghanistan who was assassinated by Al Qaeda operatives in 2001.
EDMOND ROY: There are obvious advantages in picking Ahmed Zia Masood as his running mate, since his late brother Ahmed Shah Masood has attained a martyr like status within Afghanistan.
As Karzai is himself a Poppelzei (phonetic) Pashtun from the Kandahar area whereas Ahmad Zia Masood is a Tajik from the Panscheel (phonetic) Valley to the north.
Vice-presidential candidate Ahmad Zia Masood was attacked in Faizabad, the capital of mountainous Badakhshan province in the remote northeast, where he had gone for a campaign rally.
Authorities say vice-presidential candidate Ahmad Zia Masood was in the capital of Badakshan province for an election rally.
Ahmad Zia Masood says British efforts to combat opium production in southern Afghanistan have completely failed, yet the UK and the United States had spent millions of dollars to stop the trade.
Ahmad Zia Masood said Britain and the United States had spent hundreds of millions of dollars to combat growing of opium poppies used to make heroin.