Boris Johnson's envoy met with the Taliban in Afghanistan today as part of an effort to prevent the country from becoming 'an incubator for terrorism.'
Sir Simon Gass, the Prime Minister's High Representative for Afghan Transition, met with terror chiefs in Kabul - the first summit since British forces evacuated in August.
Mr Johnson has faced down fury from Tory backbenchers over the decision to sit down with the Taliban, who have executed dissidents, tortured prisoners and forced women into hiding since seizing power from the US-backed government.
Sir Simon met with fearsome Islamist tyrants, including the de-facto leader Abdul Ghani Baradar, known as 'Baradar the Butcher', deputy prime minister Abdul-Salam Hanafi and foreign minister Amir Khan Muttaqi.
Sir Simon Gass, the Prime Minister's High Representative for Afghan Transition, met with terror chiefs in Kabul - the first summit since British forces evacuated in August (pictured: shaking hands with the Taliban foreign minister Amir Khan Muttaqi on Tuesday)
The meeting with the Taliban is the first since British troops evacuated at the end of August amid chaos at the airport that saw more than 190 people in an ISIS suicide bombing (pictured: people on the runway amid the chaos at the end of August)
Taliban fighters armed to the teeth patrol through downtown Kabul as a child sits on a bicycle on Sunday
An ISIS fighter with an AK-47 backed by a comrade in a machine gun-rigged truck stands guard in Kabul on October 3
Abdul Ghani Baradar
While Haibatullah Akhundzada is the Taliban's overall leader, Abdul Ghani Baradar is head of its political office and one of the most recognisable faces of the chiefs who have been involved in peace talks in Qatar.
His name Baradar means 'brother', a title which was conferred by Taliban founder Mullah Omar himself as a mark of affection.
The 53-year-old was deputy leader under ex-chief Mullah Mohammed Omar, whose support for Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden led to the US-led invasion of Afghanistan after 9/11.
Born in Uruzgan province in 1968, Baradar was raised in Kandahar, the birthplace of the Taliban movement. He fought with the mujahideen against the Soviets in the 1980s until they were driven out in 1989.
Afterwards, Afghanistan was gripped by a bloody civil war between rival warlords and Baradar set up an Islamic school in Kandahar with his former commander Mohammed Omar.
The two mullahs helped to found the Taliban movement, an ideology which embraced hardline orthodoxy and strived for the creation of an Islamic Emirate.
Fuelled by zealotry, hatred of greedy warlords and with financial backing from Pakistan's secret services, the Taliban seized power in 1996 after conquering provincial capitals before marching on Kabul, just as they have in recent months.
Baradar had a number of different roles during the Taliban's five-year reign and was the deputy defence minister when the US invaded in 2001.
He went into hiding but remained active in the Taliban's leadership in exile.
In 2010, the CIA tracked him down to the Pakistani city of Karachi and in February of that year the
