Abdul Salam Hanafi (Pashto: عبدالسلام حنفي, Pashto pronunciation: [ˈabdʊl saˈlɑm hanaˈfi], Uzbek/Dari: عبدالسلام حنفی) is an Afghan Uzbek political and Deobandi-Islamic[1] religious leader who is a senior leader of the Taliban, an acting second deputy prime minister, alongside Abdul Ghani Baradar and Abdul Kabir, of Afghanistan since 2021, and was a central member of the negotiation team in the Qatar office.

[6] An ethnic Uzbek, Hanafi was born in 1969 in the Gardan village in the Darzab District of Jowzjan Province.

[7] He got his initial education under local Islamic scholars, studying subjects such as Arabic grammar, logic, rhetoric, jurisprudence and Qur’anic recitation.

[7] Outside religion he also studied computer science, accounting and languages, mastering, outside his native Uzbek, Pashto, Persian, English, Arabic, Urdu, Kyrgyz, Turkmen and Turkish.

[7] After completing his studies he became a teacher in different institutions, for instance teaching Islamic culture for three years at Kabul University’s Faculty of Law and Political Science.