PESHAWAR, Aug 10: Authorities have arrested a former Afghan commander loyal to warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, intelligence officials said on Sunday.

They said Haji Jamil was arrested about a week ago in Miranshah. “He was picked up apparently to find out the whereabouts of Hekmatyar,” an intelligence official told Reuters.

Jamil, who hails from the Afghan town of Khost, fought the US-backed war against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in 1980s under Hekmatyar’s command.

The United States earlier this year declared Hekmatyar a “terrorist” for having supported and participated in “terrorist acts” committed by the Taliban and Al Qaeda.

The whereabouts of Hekmatyar, a former prime minister of Afghanistan who rained rockets on the capital Kabul while holding the position in the 1990s, have not been known since Iran expelled him last year.—Reuters