Haneef Atmar

Atmar was born in 1968 as son of Mohammad Asef Atmar in Laghman Province of Afghanistan to an aristocratic Pashtun family. As a young adult, he was part of one of many KHAD special operations units, KhAD being the Afghan security and intelligence agency with strong ties to the Soviet KGB. During the Soviet–Afghan War, he fought against the Mujahideen and lost a leg during the Battle of Jalalabad in 1989. Atmar left for the United Kingdom after the fall of Kabul. ==Studies and humanitarian work==

In the UK he earned two degrees at the University of York: a diploma in Information Technology and Computers, and an M.A. in Public Policy, International Relations and Post-war Reconstruction studies, which he studied for from 1996 to 1997. He speaks fluent Pashto, Dari, English, Urdu, and Hindi. In 1992 Atmar began advising on Afghanistan and Pakistan for humanitarian agencies, which he would continue for two years. Following that he went to the Norwegian Church Aid, where he served as Program Manager for six years until 2001. That same year he was hired as the Deputy Director General of the International Rescue Committee for Afghanistan, but after the September 11th attacks, the 2001 U.S. invasion of Afghanistan, and the Bonn Agreement creating an Afghan Transitional Authority under Hamid Karzai, Atmar left to join the new government. ==Political career==

Minister of Rural Rehabilitation and Development In 2002, Atmar was invited to join the Transitional Government as the Minister of Rural Rehabilitation & Development and was confirmed with the same portfolio in the cabinet of the newly elected President Hamid Karzai in December 2004. As one of the youngest members of cabinet and a technocrat, he directed his energies into transforming a dysfunctional and non-descript ministry into one of national significance that reached into every province of the country, overseeing an annual budget of nearly 500 million dollars at the end of his four-year tenure. Ercan Murat, Country Director for UNDP in Afghanistan described Atmar in 2004 as a human development champion. As head of a ministry that was considered a key consumer of international funds, his task entailed providing food security for the rural population, safe drinking water, alternatives for the drug-economy and building the necessary infrastructure for the economy in rural areas to develop. Minister of Education In May 2006, Atmar was sworn in as the Minister of Education after being approved by an overwhelming majority of the National Assembly. He was a member of the Presidential Oversight Committee. Minister of Interior Robert Gates and U.S. Navy admiral Michael Mullen at the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. In October 2008, Atmar was sworn in as the Minister of Interior after being approved by a majority of the National Assembly. Later career When the Truth and Justice party was founded in 2011, he became a member of the party. Minister of Foreign Affairs Atmar was appointed the acting minister of foreign affairs by President Ashraf Ghani on 4 April 2020. Ghani also nominated him as minister on permanent basis, pending approval by the National Assembly. His nomination was approved by 197 of the 246 lawmakers present in the Wolesi Jirga on 21 November, with 24 opposing, nine votes being blank and 16 being invalid. He was sworn in on 4 February 2021. ==Works==

• Development of Non-Governmental Organisations in Developing Countries • (with Arne Strand and Sultan Barakat) • Humanitarian Aid, War and Peace in Afghanistan: What to Learn? • Politics and Humanitarian Aid in Afghanistan and its Aftermath for the People of Afghanistan • Afghanistan or a Stray War in Afghanistan. • The Challenge of Winning the Peace, chapter written together with Jonathan Goodhand. published in: Searching for Peace in Central and South Asia, 2002 ==References==