SUMMARY
NRF (National Resistance Front of Afghanistan) was an Afghan rebel group involved in the conflict against the second Taleban regime in the 2020s. It has also been called the Second Resistance. The Taleban took power in Afghanistan on 15 August 2021, following the withdrawal of the international forces that had supported the previous government. When Kabul fell, remnants of the Afghan security forces gathered in traditional opposition strongholds of the Panjshir valley, and surrounding valleys of Baghlan and Parwan provinces. Ahmad Massoud, son of the anti-Soviet and anti-Taleban mujahideen Ahmad Shah Massoud, had since 2019 organized a political resistance movement in Afghanistan, following his father’s example. The movement built on the Northern Alliance, also known as United Islamic Front for the Salvation of Afghanistan (UIFSA), which was the main anti-Taleban force during the first Taleban regime in the late 1990s.
During the months leading up to the Taleban takeover in 2021, political leaders and military commanders started to organize loosely as an anti-Taleban force, and when the Taleban entered Kabul, several commanders fled to the Panjshir valley, joining Massoud’s nascent resistance movement. On 17 August 2021, two days after the fall of Kabul, ousted Vice President Amrullah Saleh cited the constitution and claimed that he was the legitimate caretaker President of Afghanistan. Together with Ahmad Massoud, he launched the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan from Panjshir.
Both Saleh and Massoud are ethnic Tajiks, Afghanistan’s second largest ethnic group, as are most inhabitants of the Panjshir valley. The Taleban movement, on the other hand, stemmed from the Pashtun ethnic group. There was an element of inter-ethnic tension between the two, although there were fighters from different ethnic groups on both sides. NRF’s ideology was one of decentralization, multiculturalism, and social justice.
Ahmad Massoud was the leader and founder of NRF. Other high-level members of the organization included Chief Commander Saleh Registani, and Head of Foreign Relations Ali M Nazary. As mentioned above, many members of the ousted regime and the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces (ANDSF) joined NRF, including former Vice President Amrullah Saleh, former Defence Minister Bismillah Mohammadi, and former ANDSF officers Khalid Amiri, Hamid Saifi, and Akmal Ameer.
NRF controlled between a few thousands and up to 10 000 troops. According to Massoud, the resistance in Panjshir had stored weapons and ammunition since his father’s time, because they knew that the day might come that the Taleban again took power in Afghanistan. In addition, the soldiers of the ousted regime that joined NRF after the takeover in August 2021 brought with themselves weapons, vehicles, and ammunition from the ANDSF. However, with Panjshir being encircled by Taleban, and without international support, NRF’s military capabilities were likely to be limited.
Tajikistan has supported NRF by giving its leaders a safe haven, and allegedly providing NRF with food and resources in the Panjshir valley. The country was also home to the official office of the NRF from October 2021. In early 2022, another Tajik resistance group announced their formation, the Afghanistan Freedom Front (AFF). The two groups cooperated and fought together on several occasions.
