The
United States backed the
Northern Alliance with air support in
Afghanistan in 2001. In 2001, Qānuni served as chief negotiator for the
Afghan Northern Alliance delegation to the Bonn conference on
Afghanistan in
Bonn, Germany. Immediately after the fall of the
Taliban government, Qānuni was interior minister in an interim administration. He was eventually made the education minister in the
Afghan Transitional Administration (established in June 2002), and served as a security advisor to interim President
Hamid Karzai. Along with Fahim and Abdullah, Qānuni was seen as one of the dominant figures of the Transitional Administration Elections for a permanent government were scheduled for 2004. When Qānuni's ally
Mohammed Fahim was passed over as vice-presidential running mate of Karzai, Qānuni entered the race for the presidency himself. On October 5, 2004, Qānuni's campaign supporter, Abdul Aziz, was assassinated while in Shindand,
Afghanistan. In the election, held October 9, 2004, he placed second to Karzai. On December 23, 2004, the newly inaugurated Karzai announced his administration, and both Qānuni and Fahim were dropped from their Ministerial posts. Qānuni was elected in the
2005 Afghan Parliamentary elections, placing second in the Kabul province. Since the presidential election he has generally been seen as the spokesman of the formerly powerful Tajik ethnic group, which dominated the Northern Alliance and the
Transitional Afghan Administration, but was largely sidelined after the 2004 presidential election. As well as his own party, Qānuni has formed an alliance of several parties called the
Jabahai Tafahim Millie. On December 21, Qānuni was chosen to lead the 249-seat lower house of parliament with 122 votes against 117 for his closest challenger,
Abdul Rasul Sayyaf. Following the death of Marshal Fahim in March 2014, Qanuni briefly became Vice-President of Afghanistan until the Presidential election was concluded in September 2014. ==External sources==