Qazi Amin Waqad

Who is Qazi Amin Waqad?

Qazi Muhammad Amin Waqad is an Afghan politician who has held a variety of political and military offices.

An ethnic Mohmand Pashtun from Nangrahar Province, Qazi Amin attended a madrasah in Pakistan, before graduating at the Islamic Law Faculty of Kabul University. While at university, he became an active member of the Islamist Muslim Youth movement. In 1975, following the repression of the Islamist movement by Daoud Khan, Qazi Amin escaped to Peshawar. During the late 1970s and early 1980s he served several times as leader of Hezbi Islami Gulbuddin, though he was more often deputy leader to Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. In 1985, he quit HIG and founded his own party, which had only a limited influence. After the fall of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan in 1992, he held a brief appointment as Minister of Communications.

In 2004, Hamid Karzai appointed Qazi Amin Waqad as his Minister of Justice.

Later, he became a leading member of the National Front, a political party opposed to the Karzai administration.