Historical Dictionary of Terrorism Third Edition

450 • MUJAHIDEENthe level of mutual extortion than cooperation. By the late 1980s thedrug traffickers began attacking the leftists in earnest. On 11 October1987 Jaime Pardo Neal, a leader of the Patriotic Union (UP) Party,the political front of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia(FARC), was killed by agents of a major drug trafficker. On 22March 1990 traffickers also assassinated UP presidential candidateBernardo Jaramillo Ossa at Bogotá airport and on 26 April 1990killed M-19 presidential candidate Carlos Pizarro León-Gómez.Ironically, both candidates had opposed extradition of narcotics traffickersto the United States. The MAS is also suspected of perpetratingthe January 1989 killings of 12 members of a judicial commissioninvestigating death squad activity in Colombia.MUJAHIDEEN. The term mujahideen (Arabic plural of mujahid, onewho engages in jihad [struggle] for the sake of God) is both a generaldesignation for Muslim fighters engaged in jihad but also has beenused as the name of various Muslim political and paramilitary groups.1. Afghan Mujahideen: Following the Soviet invasion of Afghanistanin December 1979, those rebel groups that had been fighting thepro-Communist Kabul regime then undertook to resist and expel theSoviet troops. As they were fighting what could be viewed as a jihadto rid Afghanistan of an infidel invading army, they became generallyknown as the Mujahideen.The Afghan fighters actually belonged to several different groupsoften divided along tribal and linguistic lines. Certain of these groupswere primarily Islamic fundamentalist in character, such as theHizb-i Islami (Islamic Party) of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, which receivedsupport from Iran, and the Harakat-i Inqilab-i Islami (IslamicRevolutionary Movement) led by Muhammad Nabi Muhammadi,which received support from the Persian Gulf states. Other Afghangroups, such as the National Liberation Front and the National IslamicFront of Afghanistan, were umbrella organizations that had amore nationalistic than fundamentalist emphasis.Following the 16 April 1992 collapse of the Muhammad NajibullahAhmadzi regime, the more nationalistic Mujahideen factionsformed a new government that then began fighting the Islamic fundamentalistMujahideen led by Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, which in turnlaid repeated siege to, and made rocket attacks upon, districts andgovernment buildings within Kabul.