History

In 1984, top resistance commanders operating the northern provinces of Takhar, Badakhshan

Badakhshan

Badakhshan is an historic region comprising parts of what is now northeastern Afghanistan and southeastern Tajikistan. The name is retained in Badakhshan Province which is one of the thirty-four provinces of Afghanistan, in the far northeast of Afghanistan, and contains the Wakhan Corridor...

, Balkh

Balkh

Balkh , was an ancient city and centre of Zoroastrianism in what is now northern Afghanistan. Today it is a small town in the province of Balkh, about 20 kilometers northwest of the provincial capital, Mazar-e Sharif, and some south of the Amu Darya. It was one of the major cities of Khorasan...

 and Kunduz

Kunduz

Kunduz also known as Kundûz, Qonduz, Qondûz, Konduz, Kondûz, Kondoz, or Qhunduz is a city in northern Afghanistan, the capital of Kunduz Province. It is linked by highways with Mazari Sharif to the west, Kabul to the south and Tajikistan's border to the north...

 formed a council under the leadership of Ahmad Shah Massoud. The Supervisory Council of the North became an integrated military unit with both political and security components and posed the greatest threat to the communist occupation of Afghanistan

Afghanistan

Afghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...

 in the north. Although many of the SCN leaders were affiliates of Rabbani

Rabbani

Rabbani is a Malaysian nasyid group. Rabbani's members currently consist of Ahmad Shafie, Zulkiflee Azman, Mohd Loqman Abd. Aziz, Rithauddeen Yaakob, and Azadan Abd Aziz....

’s Jamiat-e-Islami, the SCN established deep ties with local communities and ran its affairs independently from the Jamiat leadership based in Pakistan

Pakistan

Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...

. Many former SCN commanders and fighters continue to exert influence and power at various levels throughout the Northern provinces.