I.

Introduction

Taliban, Islamic fundamentalist movement in Afghanistan that controlled most of the country from September 1996 to November 2001. The Taliban movement was created in 1994 by a senior mullah (Islamic priest), Mohammed Omar, in the southern Afghanistan city of Kandahār. The name Taliban, meaning “student,” refers to the movement’s origins in Islamic religious schools, or madrasas, although most members knew war all their lives and attended the madrasas only for rudimentary religious training.