Period of Exile
Abdur Rahman lived in exile in Tashkent, then part of Russian Turkestan, for eleven years, until the 1879 death of Sher Ali, who had retired from Kabul when the British armies entered Afghanistan. The Russian governor-general at Tashkent sent for Abdur Rahman, and pressed him to try his fortunes once more across the Oxus. In March 1880, a report reached India that Abdur Rahman was in northern Afghanistan; and the governor-general, Lord Lytton, opened communications with him to the effect that the British government were prepared to withdraw their troops, and to recognize Abdur Rahman as Amir of Afghanistan, with the exception of Kandahar and some districts adjacent to it. After some negotiations, an interview took place between him and Lepel Griffin, the diplomatic representative at Kabul of the Indian government. Griffin described Abdur Rahman as a man of middle height, with an exceedingly intelligent face and frank and courteous manners, shrewd and able in conversation on the business in hand.
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