MI6 blamed for fiasco of phoney Taliban warlord who was paid a fortune
MI6 was blamed yesterday for the fiasco that saw a fake Taliban commander paid hundreds of thousands of pounds for his role in secret Afghan peace negotiations.
Intelligence officers are said to have believed the man was Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Mansour, a key insurgent leader.
But now he is thought to have been a mere shopkeeper.
A high ranking Afghan official has accused MI6 of getting ‘too excited’ about a potential breakthrough when others expressed caution.
The imposter was flown on British military planes to meetings with the Afghan government in the belief that he could help bring peace to the country.
He even met Afghan president Hamid Karzai in the presidential palace in the capital Kabul.
After two months, he disappeared with a substantial sum of money.
Yesterday Mohammad Umer Daudzai, Mr Karzai’s chief of staff, said that when British diplomats brought the man to Kabul in July or August, an Afghan official raised strong doubts about his identity. The official knew Mansour during Taliban rule, and was categoric that the man was a fake.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1333324/The-Taliban-Secret-service-pays-fortune-phoney-Afghan-warlord.html#ixzz16VicFPP8
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