25 Afghan Rebel Leaders Slain by Rival Faction

At least 25 Afghan rebel military leaders, including more than half a dozen senior field commanders, were ambushed and killed by a rival guerrilla group while returning from a strategy meeting in northern Afghanistan last week, rebel sources and Western diplomats in Pakistan confirmed Monday.

The killings, the most serious internecine violence reported among the U.S.-backed rebels in years, occurred in Takhar province, about 200 miles north of Kabul, the capital, after a four-day meeting of rebel military leaders to plan assaults against the Soviet-supported Afghan government.

After the meeting, directed by rebel commander Ahmed Shah Masoud, two groups of Masoud’s officers set out for their bases in the south through a narrow stretch of the Fakhar Valley, which is controlled by a rival rebel faction. The first group, of about five officers, was ambushed and killed Tuesday while traveling through the valley in a jeep. The next day, more than 20 officers in a small convoy of vehicles were captured and later executed, according to reports reaching Pakistan.

The slain guerrilla leaders were affiliated with a fundamentalist Muslim rebel group known as Jamaat-i-Islami, or Islamic Society, one of seven loosely allied rebel factions fighting the Kabul government.

Rebel sources charged that the ambushes were ordered by Sayad Jamal, a northern field commander associated with Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, leader of a rebel group called Hizb-i-Islami, or Islamic Party, the most radically fundamentalist and anti-Western of the factions.

One senior Western diplomat in Pakistan said the killings are certain to exacerbate the strategic difficulties already facing the guerrillas. The problems stem from continuing rivalries among rebel factions that have prevented coordinated military action and the increased efforts by Afghan President Najibullah to rally domestic and international support.

“Najibullah is going to put this on television every night,” the diplomat said.

Confirmation of the attacks reached American officials Sunday, when Peter Tomsen, the recently appointed U.S. special envoy to the rebels, met with two of Masoud’s brothers in the Pakistani border city of Peshawar, where many of the rebel groups are based.

In Washington on Monday, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher called the attacks “tragic and brutal” and reiterated that initial reports indicate they were carried out by guerrillas associated with Hekmatyar.

Boucher added that the incident will not affect U.S. support for the rebels.