SOAS Research Online

Abstract

At the core of this article stands an investigation into a legal response by a Pakistani official of the Ṭālibān to the claim of the caliphate by IS leader Abū Bakr al-Baghdādī. This treatise is understood here as an important position paper of the Ṭālibān as a whole, reacting to the changing landscape of global Islamic militancy. As such, it was triggered by a number of only loosely connected events: firstly, there is the defection of a faction of the Pakistani Ṭālibān to the IS, resulting in the establishment of its governorate “Khurasan”. This coincided, secondly, with the release of documents by the leadership of al Qāʿida in which it declared its unconditional allegiance to Ṭālibān leader Mullā Muḥammad ʿUmar. The third event was the official declaration of Mullā ʿUmar’s death in July 2015 and the subsequent election of a new leader of the Ṭālibān to whom the al-Qāʿida leadership has now transferred its allegiance. In this article it is shown that the Ṭālibān, as a movement with only regional aspirations, find themselves trapped in a dispute over global leadership within Muslim militant circles, crystallizing between al-Qāʿida and the IS.