MEI - Taliban

Mullah Nooruddin Turabi, one of the Taliban’s most senior and longstanding leaders, has headed the State Ministry for National Disaster Management since early July 2024. Before assuming this position, he served as Deputy Chairman of the Afghanistan Red Crescent Society (ARCS).

During the 1990s, Turabi served as the last Minister of Justice under the Taliban regime before surrendering to U.S. forces following the regime's overthrow in 2001. At the time, he gained notoriety for reportedly dismissing educated bureaucrats from the Taliban administration. After 2001, he is reported to have led the Taliban’s Commission for Prisoner Affairs.

Turabi fought alongside Afghan jihadi leader Abdul Rab Rasool Sayyaf against Soviet forces in the 1980s, during which he reportedly lost an eye and a leg. An ideological figure within the movement, he maintained close ties with the Taliban's founder, Mullah Mohammad Omar, as well as Mullah Mohammad Hassan Akhund, the current Taliban prime minister.

With roots in Kandahar, some reports indicate Turabi was born in mid-1950s in Chora district of Uruzgan province. He reportedly holds an Afghanistan passport number P00429243 (issued December 15, 2021 in Kabul; expires August 15, 2031), listing a birth date of July 30, 1969, though he is believed to be older. He is listed under the United Nations sanctions regime under designation TAi.058.