Rebel leader is remembered by Afghan public

Thousands of Afghans paid tribute to the former Northern Alliance leader Ahmed Shah Masood, yesterday on the anniversary of his assassination by suspected al-Qa'ida agents.

A large portrait of the commander known as "the Lion of Panjshir" was unveiled in a ceremony attended by schoolchildren, soldiers and political leaders at Kabul's main stadium – an arena still notorious for public executions staged by the Taliban.

Black flags hung from windows across the capital. Police and peace-keepers were on high alert because of a spate of attacks – suspected of being perpetrated by resurgent Taliban and al-Qa'ida militants – that reached a peak on Thursday when a bomb killed 26 in Kabul and President Hamid Karzai escaped an assassination attempt in Kandahar.

Mr Karzai, the US-backed head of Afghanistan's government, was in New York yesterday so his Defence Minister, Mohammad Qasim Fahim, led the tributes for Masood.

"He was the one who resisted the Taliban and the al-Qa'ida network for five and a half years and guided his people towards prosperity and freedom," said Mr Fahim. Masood's 13-year-old son, Ahmad, wearing his father's woollen hat, shook hands with dignitaries and told the crowd: "Today we promise to follow the way of the martyrs."

Masood was blown up near the Tajik border by two Arabs posing as television journalists, who many believe were acting on the instructions of Osama bin Laden. Masood, a Tajik, had been the linchpin of the anti-Taliban forces and there were fears that the Northern Alliance would fall apart without him. But, with the backing of American bombers, opposition forces routed the Taliban with ease.

Masood's reputation grew during his time as a mujahedin commander against the Soviet invasion in the 1980s.

Yesterday, unarmed troops lined the Panjshir Valley, which leads up to Masood's mountain shrine. In the city of Mazar-i-Sharif, controlled by the Uzbek warlord Abdul Rashid Dostum, a large ceremony was held at the blue-domed Zeyarte Sakhi mausoleum.