Foreign ministry In October 2001 the Taliban regime was overthrown by
Operation Enduring Freedom including American and
United Front forces. As a result of the
International Conference on Afghanistan in Bonn in 2001, Abdullah was appointed Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Interim Administration in December 2001. In November 2001, a diplomatic crisis unfolded when the British government, without any forewarning or seeking permission from the Northern Alliance, flew members of the British
Special Boat Service to
Bagram. Abdullah was "apoplectic" as he considered the uninvited arrival to be a violation of sovereignty, and complained bitterly to the head of the
Central Intelligence Agency field office, threatening to resign if the British did not withdraw. British
Foreign Secretary Jack Straw tried to reassure the Northern Alliance that the deployment was not a vanguard of a British peacekeeping army, but Northern Alliance leaders did not believe them; with the threat of the Northern Alliance opening fire on incoming
Royal Air Force troop transports, the deployment was put on hold. Following the
2004 Afghan presidential election, Abdullah was one of the few people who kept their position from the Transitional Government and was re-appointed as Minister of Foreign Affairs for another year. In 2005 he resigned his position.
2009 presidential election ,
Anwar ul-Haq Ahady, and Abdullah in April 2009 On 6 May 2009, Abdullah registered as an Independent candidate for the
2009 Afghan presidential election, running against incumbent president
Hamid Karzai. Abdullah selected as his running mates Humayun Shah Asefi as his First Vice President and Dr. Cheragh Ali Cheragh (a surgeon from Kabul who is a practicing
Shi'i Muslim) as Second Vice President. Afghanistan has an
executive structure featuring two
vice presidents, a First VP and a Second VP, to help ensure a stable government by attempting to provide ethnic and religious balance to senior government leadership positions. Unofficial and non-certified electoral results were announced during the day on 16 September 2009, showing that Abdullah was in second position with 27.8% of the total votes cast. President Karzai did not achieve the 50.01% vote majority required to avoid a runoff election. A large number of fraudulent ballots, mostly belonging to Karzai's camp, were disallowed by the Independent Afghan Electoral Commission. Karzai came under intense international political and diplomatic pressure from international leaders because of allegations of large-scale fraud. Hamid Karzai eventually agreed to participate in a designated head-to-head runoff election (held between the contenders with the two largest numbers of total votes in the first election) which was scheduled nationwide for 7 November 2009. On 1 November 2009, Abdullah announced that he had decided to withdraw from the runoff election, citing his lack of faith in the President Karzai government's ability to hold a "fair and transparent" second election process. Subsequently, Hamid Karzai was declared the winner by the Afghan Electoral Commission (essentially winning by default).
National Coalition of Afghanistan After the 2009 Afghan Presidential Elections, Abdullah created the Coalition for Change and Hope (CCH). The NCA presented the leading democratic opposition movement against the government of Hamid Karzai. Abdullah and Ghani were then bound to compete in a
run-off election in June 2014. The results of that election remained in dispute through until September 2014, with Abdullah claiming the government and the national electoral institutions manipulated the results. Pressure from the United States on the two candidates to resolve their differences, and to negotiate a power-sharing deal were initially agreed to, but Abdullah later remained defiant. A UN-led audit failed to sway Abdullah as he insisted the audit team could not explain a million extra votes counted in the run-off. Ghani supporters insisted they wanted to do a deal with Abdullah, and said they were leaving the door open to negotiations. On 19 September, the
Independent Election Commission (Afghanistan) announced Ghani the winner. Five hours later, Abdullah and Ghani signed a power-sharing agreement, with Ghani being named president and Abdullah taking on an important position in the government; the deal was signed in front of the presidential palace, with incumbent president Hamid Karzai in attendance. Serving as Chief Executive, Abdullah actively met with international business leaders and politicians alike, seeking foreign investment and support. He further sought to implement a number of ceasefires with the Taliban. Citing mistrust of the Taliban, Abdullah took a somewhat more hardline stance against the Taliban movement than his presidential counterpart Ashraf Ghani, noting a number of failed attempts at long-term peace.
2019 presidential election Incumbent Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah registered as a candidate for the
2019 presidential election. Abdullah selected Enayatullah Babur Farahmand as his First Vice President and
Asadullah Sadati as Second Vice President. After the election results showed that
Ashraf Ghani was declared the winner, Abdullah declared himself the winner as well, sparking a political crisis and leading him to publicly state that he would form a parallel government. On 9 March 2020, both Abdullah and Ghani took the presidential oath of office at separate inauguration ceremonies. The United States pressured the Afghan government to come up with a solution by cutting $1 billion of aid. This, with mounting international pressure and the threat of the Taliban, forced officials to strike a deal between Abdullah and Ghani. The deal left President Ghani in charge of executive power and created the High Council of National Reconciliation. Mr. Abdullah is head of the council, where he will lead peace efforts with the Taliban.
High Council for National Reconciliation (2020–2021) meeting with Afghan President
Ashraf Ghani and Abdullah Abdullah, 25 June 2021, two months before the
fall of Kabul On 17 May 2020, a deal was reached where Abdullah was to lead the country's High Council for National Reconciliation (HCNR) as a chairman. Moreover, HCNR was given the authority to handle and approve all affairs related to the
Afghan peace process. The Council held its first meeting in December 2020, several months after its official creation, despite having incomplete membership and power struggles. Following the collapse of the Republican government and Abdullah's meeting with Hekmatyar, the political fate of the HCNR remains unclear. On 1 September 2021, Taliban representatives said that they had approached former president
Hamid Karzai and Abdullah. The representatives said that the Taliban was "ready to recruit them" but said that Karzai was unlikely to be part of the government as they do not want "old horses". As for Abdullah, the Taliban showed a different approach saying that he was the "least controversial."
Taliban takeover and subsequent activities In February 2022, Abdullah was temporarily placed under
house arrest by the
Taliban in Afghanistan. On 4 May 2022 he was allowed to leave for India to be with his family during
Eid al-Fitr. He returned to Afghanistan on 11 June. ==See also==