Ex-King Heads Home to Kabul After 29 Years

KABUL, Afghanistan — The former king of this war-battered nation was heading for home early today after nearly three decades in exile, with family members playing down the security threat he may face.

Despite reports of plots to assassinate Mohammad Zaher Shah, and the arrest of suspects in an alleged bombing campaign in Kabul two weeks ago, the ex-king was in high spirits shortly before his departure from Italy, according to family members at his residence near Rome. He was expected to arrive in Kabul, Afghanistan’s capital, this morning.

“He’s not a man who is easily afraid,” said Zaher Shah’s cousin Walishah Wali, one of eight family members returning on the flight. Zaher Shah survived an assassination attempt about 10 years ago.

Although the king is returning as a private citizen, not a monarch, his arrival is of great symbolic significance to many Afghans, and he has broad support among his countrymen.

Zaher Shah was deposed in 1973 by a cousin, and only older Afghans remember his reign, but he is identified in the popular consciousness with the country’s last period of peace and stability.

While Zaher Shah’s supporters say his return will build a sense of national unity, detractors--including some figures from the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance, whose members control the main security ministries--question what the 87-year-old former monarch can achieve in Afghanistan.

Plans for a big welcoming ceremony in Kabul were scrapped because of safety concerns. Security was extremely tight in preparation for the return, with police at main intersections stopping all vehicles to check drivers and passengers.

Speaking shortly before Zaher Shah left his residence in Italy, Wali said the ex-king’s “mood is excellent. He’s very well. He is calm. He has a mission to perform, and he is very eager to perform it.”

He said Zaher Shah had no doubts about the security arrangements in place in Kabul.

“All we wish for is that the return of the king can create a sense of unity in the country,” Wali said. “He’s not coming to take back the crown. He is coming as a man who was king for 40 years and is respected by his people. He feels the respect they have for him will enable him to get them to unite and put an end to the strife.”

Supporters hope his return will send a message that Afghanistan is moving toward stability and peace, signaling to refugees that it is safe to return and promoting reconciliation among ethnic and factional groups after more than two decades of war.

Early today, even as the former king was winging his way to Afghanistan, people in Kabul were unsure whether the rumors that he was coming were true. But there was growing excitement.

“I guess it’s a special day,” said merchant Haji Ziauddin, 65, who remembered Zaher Shah’s reign as a time of stability.

He said the king achieved little for Afghan development in his time, “but he has always been sympathetic to all Afghan people. . . . People trust him very much.”

Shopkeeper Mohammed Bayad, 55, said people would accept Zaher Shah as king, president “or under any name, if he brings peace.”

“I remember his era. They were good days. There was never any fighting or misuse of power,” he said. “Schools were active, merchants were working, banks were working. There was no robbery.”

Three of Zaher Shah’s six offspring traveled with him to Kabul: his sons Ahmad Shah, about 68, Mohammad Nadir, about 61, and Mir Wais, about 45. In addition, he traveled with three cousins, Wali, Abdul Wali and Sultan Mahmoud Ghazi, and two grandchildren.

His wife, Homaira, 86, suffering from osteoporosis, is under constant medical care and remained in Italy.

Zaher Shah was escorted home by interim Afghan Prime Minister Hamid Karzai, who said earlier that the security situation in Kabul was “perfect” for the ex-king’s return.

The ex-king’s party flew out of Pratica di Mare military air base outside Rome on an Italian air force jet. On board were Zaher Shah’s doctor and Italian Deputy Foreign Minister Margherita Boniver. Also on board were Italian military personnel, including two doctors, two nurses equipped with a heart defibrillating machine and nine police officers.

After landing in Uzbekistan, the entourage had breakfast and switched to two Italian air force C-130s, equipped to respond to a missile attack, for the flight to Afghanistan.

The former king’s arrival was delayed by three weeks because of concerns about an alleged plot to shoot down his plane with a missile.

Two weeks ago, Afghanistan’s interim government claimed to have unearthed another plot, involving a plan to kill Zaher Shah, Karzai and other top government officials with a bomb. Dozens of people were arrested, all of them opponents of the interim administration.

The former king and his entourage have played down his ambitions to regain the crown, but he said in a March interview with The Times that if the Afghan people wanted him as king, he would not refuse.

Members of Afghanistan’s interim administration have shown little enthusiasm for restoring the monarchy, but some observers believe that Zaher Shah’s family is hoping to steer the ex-king’s son Mir Wais to the crown.

Although the former monarch enjoys support among Afghan citizens, it is not clear how much political clout he will have.

Zaher Shah, like Karzai, is a Pushtun. His return should provide a greater sense of comfort to the country’s largest ethnic group, which makes up about 40% of the population but feels underrepresented in the interim administration. The key Defense, Interior and Foreign Ministry portfolios are held by ethnic Tajiks, mainly from the Northern Alliance, which fought alongside U.S. and allied forces to depose the Pushtun-dominated Taliban regime.

The former king’s main role in the coming months will be to convene a grand council in June. The group will choose the country’s next leader and government. That administration will stay in power until elections are held 18 months later.

Those least enthusiastic about Zaher Shah’s return are ethnic Tajik moujahedeen commanders, who have criticized him for remaining aloof from Afghanistan’s civil war while they fought against the Taliban.

They’ve made clear their opposition to a return of the monarchy.

Former President Burhanuddin Rabbani, a top Northern Alliance figure, has said he does not oppose Zaher Shah’s return as long as he is not reinstalled as monarch. Others merely say that any former citizen is entitled to return to his homeland.

One question is whether the ex-king will be free to travel around Afghanistan, or whether he will be hemmed in at his home by security concerns. He has expressed his determination to travel throughout the country and mix with Afghans, but coalition forces are still working to clear eastern Afghanistan of Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters.

Several recent attacks have raised fears about security, including a bombing this month that hit a convoy carrying Defense Minister Mohammed Qassim Fahim in Jalalabad--apparently an assassination attempt. Fahim survived.

The king’s security will be provided by 40 Afghan bodyguards who were trained by international forces. They will be backed by carabinieri, Italian paramilitary police, who will remain at the former king’s residence for two to three months.

“The new Afghanistan welcomes all its sons, including the former king . . . a fatherly figure, a symbol of unity,” Karzai said in Rome.