KABUL, June 28: Afghan authorities have discovered mass graves containing the bodies of ex-president Mohammad Daud Khan, family members and aides, who were killed in a Soviet-backed coup three decades ago, his grandson said.

“Two mass graves, one containing 16 bodies and the other 12, were found. We recognised by their shoes and clothes that the graves belonged to the deceased Daud Khan, his family and cabinet members,” his grandson Mahmoud Ghazi Daud told reporters on Saturday.

He did not give details on the discovery.

The graves were recently discovered by a commission appointed in April by President Hamid Karzai at the request of Daud Khan’s family.

Daud Khan, Afghanistan’s first president, was shot dead in the presidential palace in a military coup in April 1978.—Reuters