Kandahar Province

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Kandahar قندھار
Image:Afghanistan-Kandahar.png
Capital • Coordinates	Kandahar • 31.608° N 65.705° E
Population (2002) • Density	886,000 • /km²
Area	54,022 km²
Time zone	UTC+4:30
Main language(s)	Pashto

Kandahar or Qandahar (locally: قندھار) is one of the thirty-four provinces of Afghanistan. It is famous for being the birthplace of Mughal Empress Nur Jehan, who married Jahangir. Located in the south of the country, its capital is the city of Kandahar. Gul Agha Sherzai was Governor of the province before and after the Taliban regime, until early 2004, when mounting criticism of his efforts led President Hamid Karzai to remove him from the post. Currently the US, Canadian, British along with ISAF soldiers (Nato forces) are in Kandahar on a mission, they also have bases in Kandahar. The current Governor is Asadullah Khalid. Kandahar province is made up of 17 districts each with its own sub-governor. For the last 250 years, pashtoons have been ruling Afghanistan. History shows that most of the Afghan rulers were from Qandahar: Nadir Shah, Zahir shah, Amir Abdurrahman Khan, etc.

Some prominent members from Kandahar include the late Mawlavi Abdullah Fayaz, a native from Kandahar who was appointed as the senior cleric of the Islamic council by President Karzai. He was a key supporter of President Karzai. Fayaz openly spoke against the Taliban in Afghanistan and as a result received several death threats from the Taliban. In May 2005 Fayaz was shot in the head by two men on a motorcycle as he left his office. The incident took place shortly after a speech he made attacking the Taliban leader, Mullah Omar. The Taliban claimed responsibility for that attack. Fayaz frequently condemned the acts of the Taliban. Two days after Fayaz was killed there was a funeral held for him at a mosque in Kandahar where a suicide bomber blew himself up killing Kabul's police chief Mohammed Akram who was a very well liked police chief in Afghanistan. Twenty other people were also killed during the bombing that took place at Fayaz's funeral. Template:Mawlavi Abdullah Fayaz was the son of Template:Abdu Rabb Akhounzada who was another very popular spiritual leader from Kandahar. The people of Kandahar remember Abdu Rabb Akhounzada as an extremely gifted and charismatic public speaker who had a positively amazing affect on his followers.

During the late 70's Abdu Rabb Akhounzada mysteriously disappeared and many people from Kandahar believe that he was kidnapped my the communists and killed by being thrown out of an airplane.

Mohammed Nabi Yusufi who was Abdu Rabb Akhounzada's uncle served as a community leader and Imam for the Afghan community in New York for nearly a quarter of a century. In Kandahar Mohammed Nabi Yusufi had a burgeoning export business; he had homes both in the capital Kabul and his home town of Kandahar. Mohammed Nabi Yusufi fled Afghanistan shortly after the Russians invaded Afghanistan in 1979. Mohammed Nabi Yusufi held a post in King Zahir Shah's government as an emir and was the president of the Kandahar chamber of commerce, as well the mayor of Zabol. He traveled extensively throughout the world due to his business and brought new ideas and teachings back to Afghanistan. He spoke five languages and spoke at hundreds of lectures. Yusufi, despite coming from a religious, spiritual family was a very modern man inside the conservative circles that existed in Kandahar. He carried the same modern outlook and moderate views through out his life. Mohammed Nabi Yusufi led groups to the United Nations to raise awareness about the Russian invasion into Afghanistan and to bring attention to the hundreds of Afghans that were being killed by the Soviets in the early 80's. In 1985 Yusufi was asked to be the spiritual and community leader by several Afghans residing in New York City who began to realize that the settlement of Afghans in the area had no center for religious and cultural services. He was the Imam of the Sayed Jamaluddin Afghani Mosque in Queens, New York which doubles as a community center. As the Imam in New York he dealt with numerous needs inside the Afghan community and cared for all people who asked for his guidance with genuine concern for his people. On November 8th 2005 Yusufi suddenly suffered a heart attack that doctors at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York worked on and performed a successful angioplasty. Yusufi was in fine health with no indications of heart disease prior to this heart attack. Yusufi passed away on November 28th 2005 from ARDS that was caused from the complications of the heart attack he suffered twenty days before his passing. There was a sudden out pour of sadness and grief amongst the Afghan community that he served for so long. Members of the Afghan community have said that he was a very knowledgeable man who was very fair and moderate in his views and a devout Muslim. When Mohammed Nabi Yusufi was asked which side he was on he would often reply “I don't have a side, I am on the side of justice and truth." He was arguably the most admired and well liked Imam in the Afghan Community.