Commander Hazrat Ali has appointed Commander Hamkar from Kunarh as the new chief of the Brigade.
Awal Gul, a mid-level commander who played a key role in persuading Taliban commanders to surrender Nangarhar province to a council of tribal leaders, was arrested on Sunday, with Afghan sources saying that more than 40 Arab nationals have been captured by Commander Hazrat Ali's forces so far.
"We have arrested Awal Gul because he was in contact with Al Qaida forces," Mohammed Zaman, the province's defense chief said, refusing to elaborate.
Gul had helped the Taliban when its forces moved into Nangarhar in 1996 and had established close links with Osama bin Laden and his terrorist network, said Atiqullah Racham, a military aide to provincial governor Haji Abdul Qadeer.
"We didn't want to arrest him the first day we took over Jalalabad. We wanted to first capture Tora Bora, then arrest Awal Gul," Racham said. "He thought he might get a big position in the new government, but the (governing council) wants to arrest anyone who had contact with Al Qaida."
Racham said he didn't believe Gul's arrest would have any impact on the stability of Nangarhar province, which borders Pakistan.
Gul commanded a small militia loyal to Yunnis Khalis, a conservative Pashtun tribal elder who was an important leader in the war against the Soviet occupation in the 1980s. Khalis, an Egypt-educated expert on Islamic law, welcomed the rise of the Taliban in 1996.
Today, Khalis is elderly and too ill to leave his home.
And while he maintains a small militia, his role in eastern Afghan politics is limited to elder statesman and he holds no formal title in the new government.
With the capture of three Arab nationals and three U.S. Stinger missiles by forces loyal to Eastern Shoora in Tora Bora during the last couple of days, however, the tension between two main contenders for the top provincial slot in Nangarhar, which they believe has fallen vacant due to Qadeer's decision to join the government in Kabul is running high.
The sources said from Jalalabad that the situation was tense in the city and armed guards from both sides are preparing for a show down because of lack of trust between the two main rivals and competition for the post of the top provincial position.
The two rivals are also at loggerheads over the surrender and arrest of Al Qaida fighters due to the fact that both want to capture as many as Arabs as they could to appease the Americans and wrest control of the important military installations and government posts in a future set up.
Afghan sources said that majority of the arrested Arab and other foreign nationals in Tora Bora and other parts of Nangarhar, are presently in Hazrat Ali's custody.
Sources closed to Zaman said that the Corps Commander of Jalalabad was in favour of handing over all the arrested foreign nationals to the interim government in Kabul, while Hazrat Ali, they said would like to strike a direct deal with the Americans by surrendering the captured Al Qaida fighters to the U.S. forces.
Zaman, the sources said, has proposed to appoint a third person as governor of the province to reduce the existing tension, a demand so far rejected by Hazrat Ali.
