Hezb-e Islami Gulbuddin

Hezb-e Islami Gulbuddin
حزب اسلامی گلبدین
Leader	Gulbuddin Hekmatyar
Dates active	1976–2016 (as a Paramilitary organization) 1976–2023 (as a political party)
Dissolved	2023
Merger of	Taliban
Allegiance	Pakistan
Group	Zafar brigade
Active regions	Afghanistan
Ideology	Qutbism Pashtun interests Anti-American sentiment Anti-Sovietism Anti-communism
Political position	Right-wing
Size	1,500–2,000+ (2015 estimate)
Part of	Peshawar Seven Northern Alliance
Wars	Soviet–Afghan War Second Afghan Civil War First Nagorno-Karabakh War Third Afghan Civil War War in Afghanistan

Hezb-e-Islami Gulbuddin (Dari: حزب اسلامی گلبدین; abbreviated HIG), also referred to as Hezb-e-Islami or Hezb-i-Islami Afghanistan (HIA), is an Afghan political party and former paramilitary organization, originally founded in 1976 as Hezb-e-Islami and led by Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. In 1979, Mulavi Younas Khalis split with Hekmatyar and established his own group, which became known as Hezb-i Islami Khalis; the remaining part of Hezb-e Islami, still headed by Hekmatyar, became known as Hezb-e Islami Gulbuddin. Hezbi Islami seeks to emulate the Muslim Brotherhood and to replace the various tribal factions of Afghanistan with one unified Islamic state. This puts them at odds with the more tribe-oriented Taliban (which is predominantly Pashtun).

During the Soviet War in Afghanistan (1979–1989), Hezb-e Islami Gulbuddin was well-financed by anti-Soviet forces through the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI). In the mid-1990s, the HIG was "sidelined from Afghan politics" by the rise of the Taliban. In the post-2001 war in Afghanistan, HIG "reemerged as an aggressive militant group, claiming responsibility for many bloody attacks against Coalition forces and the administration of President Hamid Karzai". Its fighting strength was "sometimes estimated to number in the thousands". The group signed a peace deal with the Ghani administration in 2016.

Following the collapse of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, on 17 August 2021, Hekmatyar met with both Karzai, former President of Afghanistan, and Abdullah Abdullah, Chairman of the High Council for National Reconciliation and former Chief Executive, in Doha seeking to form a government (though it was unclear whether either Karzai or Abdullah would be directly involved in any such government). President Ashraf Ghani, having fled the country to either Tajikistan or Uzbekistan, emerged in the UAE and said that he supported such negotiations and was in talks to return to Afghanistan.