President Ronald Reagan meeting with Afghan Mujahideen leaders in the Oval Office in 1983
The movement originated in the early 1990s, but was not fully unified until its 1994 capture of Kandahar. Under the leadership of Mohammed Omar, the movement spread throughout most of Afghanistan, sequestering power from the Mujahideen warlords, whose corruption and despotism Afghans had tired of. The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan was established in 1996 and the Afghan capital transferred to Kandahar. It held control of most of the country until being overthrown by the American-led invasion of Afghanistan in December 2001 following the September 11 attacks. At its peak, formal diplomatic recognition of the Taliban's government was acknowledged by only three nations: Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. The group later regrouped as an insurgency movement to fight the American-backed Karzai administration and the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF).
The Taliban have been condemned internationally for the harsh enforcement of their interpretation of Islamic Sharia law, which has resulted in the brutal treatment of many Afghans, especially women. During their rule from 1996 to 2001, the Taliban and their allies committed massacres against Afghan civilians, denied UN food supplies to 160,000 starving civilians and conducted a policy of scorched earth, burning vast areas of fertile land and destroying tens of thousands of homes. In its post-9/11 insurgency, the group has been accused of using terrorism as a specific tactic to further their ideological and political goals. According to the United Nations, the Taliban and their allies were responsible for 75% of Afghan civilian casualties in 2010, 80% in 2011, and 80% in 2012.
The Taliban emerged in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar around September 1994.
The Taliban's ideology has been described as anti-modern, combining an "innovative form" of sharia Islamic law based on Deobandi fundamentalism and the militant Islamism and Salafi jihadism of Osama bin Laden, with Pashtun social and cultural norms known as Pashtunwali, as most Taliban are Pashtun tribesmen.
The Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence and military are widely alleged by the international community to have provided support to the Taliban during their founding and time in power, and of continuing to support the Taliban during the insurgency. Pakistan states that it dropped all support for the group after the September 11 attacks. Al-Qaeda also supported the Taliban with fighters from Arab countries and Central Asia. Saudi Arabia provided financial support. Hundreds of thousands of people were forced to flee to United Front-controlled territory, Pakistan, and Iran.
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