Mohammad Gulab Mangal - Attempts On His Life

Attempts On His Life

According to the New York Times, Mangal has faced at least four attempts on his life. The British tabloid the Sun reports that Mangal, whose son has been granted asylum in the UK, has survived more than a dozen assassination attempts and “lives in a heavily-fortified compound, lined with razor wire and blast-proof walls”, protected by British troops, and “goes out in disguise, shadowed by 15 bodyguards”.

In October 2006, Mangal′s convoy was struck by a bomb attack east of Kabul, for which the Taliban claimed responsibility, narrowly missing him, killing one provincial official.

In May 2008, while flying into Musa Qala with a British escort to dedicate a new mosque, the CH-47 Chinook helicopter in which he was flying was hit by rocket fire.

In February 2009, two U.S. soldiers who were part of a convoy of coalition troops accompanying Mangal to a village where he intended to talk to residents about alternatives to opium farming were killed along with three Afghans, including a police official, while trying to disable a roadside bomb.

In April 2010, three Italian citizens and six Afghans who worked at a hospital run by the Italian charity Emergency in the capital of Helmand Province, Lashkar Gah were detained, suspected of having planned suicide attacks. According to Mangal, he was the target of the planned attacks that would have killed many more people as well. Afghan authorities claimed the detainees later confessed, but the Taliban denied hiring any foreign aid workers, and they were later released without charges. The hospital staff had become unpopular with local officials, as they had a reputation for treating wounded Taliban fighters.