Afghan Profiles - Nur Muhammad Taraki<title> <meta name="description" content="Afghan personalities - Nur Mohammad Taraki"> <meta name="keywords" content="Afghanistan communist regime, taraki pdpa leader, hafiz ullah amin, karmal, kabul government in the 70's, anti-communist"> </head> <body link="#000080" vlink="#000080" alink="#800000"> <p><b><font size="2" face="Verdana">Safis Web Exclusive</font></b><br> <b><font color="#FF8F20"><font size="4">Profile:</font></font><font size="4"> </font><font color="#800000" size="3">TARAKI, NUR MUHAMMAD</font></b></p> <table border="1" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" style="border-collapse: collapse" bordercolor="#111111" width="500" id="AutoNumber1"> <tr> <td width="487"><b><font size="6" face="Bangle" color="#FF8F20"><img border="1" src="images/tarakii.jpg" align="left"></font></b><p> <b> <font size="5" face="Bangle" color="#FF8F20">N</font><font size="2" face="Verdana">ur</font><font size="2" face="Verdana"> Muhammad Taraki</font></b><font size="1" face="Verdana"> was member of the Khalq faction of the PDPA and, after the Saur Revolt, president of the Revolutionarv Council and primer minister of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan. <br> <br> Taraki was born of a Ghilzai nomad family on July 15, 1917 in Ghazni province. After attending a village school in Nawa, Ghazni province, he took night courses in Bombay and college credit in Kabul. He worked as a clerk for Abdul Majid Zabuli at the Pashtun Trading Company in Kandahar and at its office in Bombay. Because of his knowledge of English he was able to obtain employment in various Afghan ministries and at Bakhtar News Agency. <br> <br> <b><br> </font> <font size="5" face="Bangle" color="#FF8F20">I</font><font size="1" face="Verdana">n the 1950s he became known as an uthor and journalist, and in 1953 he served for a few months as press attache at the Afghan embassy in Washington.</font></b><font size="1" face="Verdana"> Subsequently he opened the "Nur Translation Bureau" in Kabul, which translated Dari and Pashto materials for various foreign missions in Kabul, including the American embassy.</font></p> <p><font size="1" face="Verdana">His ideological transformation from social critic to Communist occurred in the early 1960s. Taraki convened the Founding congress" of the PDPA on January 1, 1965, which was attended by 30 persons. The members elected him secretary general in a split decision, some voting for his subsequent rival Babrak Karmal, who was elected secretary of the central committee. <br> <br> </font><b><font size="5" face="Bangle" color="#FF8F20">I</font></b><font size="1" face="Verdana">n April 1966, Taraki started publication of <i>Khalq (</i>q.v.), the party organ, which became also the name of his faction of the PDPA. In 1967 the party split into two factions over tactical and leadership disputes, until ten years later they reunited and attained power in a coup in April 1978.</font></p> <p><font size="1" face="Verdana"><b>After the Saur Revolt, Taraki became the "Great Leader" and a personality cult prepared the way to legitimize his rule as the "teacher and great guide" of the Communist movement.</b> Leading Parchamis were purged from government positions and Taraki's Khalqis ruled until a new split developed among the Khalqis. Hafizollah Amin (q.v.) attacked his former teacher as unfit for leadership. The "red khalqis" of Taraki and black khalqis" of Amin were pitted against each other and Hafizullah prevailed. On October 9, 1979, Taraki was secretly executed.<br> <br> <br> <br> </font> <font face="Verdana"><span lang="EN-GB"><font size="1"> <b> <a href="javascript:history.go(-1)" onMouseOver="self.status=document.referrer;return true" style="text-decoration: none"> Back</a></b></font></span></font></p> <p><font face="Verdana" size="1">--------------------<br> The End.<br> </font></td> </tr> </table> <script type="text/javascript" language="JavaScript">var site="sm9safisweb"</script> <script type="text/javascript" language="JavaScript1.2" src="http://sm9.sitemeter.com/js/counter.js?site=sm9safisweb"> </script> <noscript> <a href="http://sm9.sitemeter.com/stats.asp?site=sm9safisweb" target="_top"> <img src="http://sm9.sitemeter.com/meter.asp?site=sm9safisweb" alt="Site Meter" border="0"/></a> </noscript>  </body> </html>