Valley of Five Lions is still out of Taliban reach

The Panjshir valley is one of the last remaining hotbeds of resistance in Afghanistan after the Taliban took over total control.

Afghanistan's former Vice President Amrullah Saleh, accompanied by Ahmad Massoud, the son of Ahmad Shah Massoud, have both taken refuge in the area and called for an uprising against the Taliban.

The Panjshir valley plays a crucial role in this uprising against the Taliban, who now wreak havoc against citizens, despite their assurances of being 'moderate' in their rule.

A Twitter account dedicated to documenting resistance effort in Panjshir valley said on Sunday that the Taliban, with weapons and vehicles, were heading towards the area to capture and attack. It also said the anti-Taliban forces in the area would fight against the move. However, the account later claimed the contingent of Taliban were instead heading towards Baghlan province.

Panjshir, or the "Five Lions", is one of the 34 provinces of Afghanistan, located in the northeastern region of the nation containing the Panjshir Valley, which is nestled in the peaks of Hindu Kush in north of Kabul. It is now controlled by the Second Resistance, and the only province yet to be captured by the Taliban since the 2021 Taliban onslaught.

Panjshir became a separate province from adjacent Parwan Province in 2004. It is surrounded by Baghlan and Takhar in the north, Badakhshan and Nuristan in the east, Laghman and Kapisa in the south, and Parwan in the west.

The name is derived from a tale that five brothers managed to hold back the floodwaters in the 10th century. They allegedly built a dam for Sultan Mahmud of Ghazni.

An anti-Taliban militia loyal to the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan fled Kabul when the Taliban took control in the late 1990s. They formed the Panjshir Resistance and fought against the nascent Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan then.

The former flag of the Northern Alliance was flown by the new resistance troops. There is still hope for Panjshir opposition to push the Taliban back and take control of the province, although some experts doubt it.

Amrullah Saleh, who was born in Panjshir in 1972 to a Tajik family, was orphaned at a young age. He was raised in the heart of where the resistance began under the leader of the resistance, Ahmad Shah Massoud, and joined the movement at a young age.

Saleh's sister was tortured to death by Taliban fighters in 1996, according to reports. "What happened in 1996 changed my perception of the Taliban permanently," Saleh wrote in an editorial for Time magazine.

He fought alongside his leader and as part of the Northern Alliance to take down the Taliban.