Contributor(s): Felix Kuehn, Alex Strick van Linschoten | Born in a small village of Kandahar, Abdul Salam Zaeef rose to become a senior member of the Taliban. His memoirs of his former role, recently translated from Pashto and edited by Alex Strick van Linschoten and Felix Kuehn, reveal an extraordinary and provocative counter-narrative to the standard accounts of Afghanistan since 1979. Using My Life with the Taliban as an entry point to discussion at this lunchtime event, Alex Strick van Linschoten and Felix Kuehnwill explore the history and role of Kandahar: the birthplace of the Taliban movement and focal area for the recently announced military 'surge'.