In July 2007, one year after Shamil Basayev’s death, Taziev became his official successor as the most high-ranking military commander in the rebel forces.

Those reports were proved incorrect two years later, when Taziev was declared wanted by Russia for the assassination of the Ingush deputy Interior Minister Dzhabrail Kostoyev in May 2006.

According to FSB information, Ali Taziyev was an Ingush Interior Ministry policeman who disappeared without a trace in 1998 and was declared legally dead in 2000, but instead might have joined forces of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria (ChRI).

[5] A month after Basayev's death Taziev was appointed military leader of the Caucasian Front by the President of Ichkeria Dokka Umarov; at the same time Yevloyev still held leadership of the Ingush Jamaat.

Russian sources have also repeatedly blamed him for some of the most deadly attacks on security forces in Ingushetia and neighbouring regions, including the raids of Nazran and Nalchik, in which he worked closely with Shamil Basayev, Dokka Umarov, Ilyas Gorchkhanov and Anzor Astemirov.

It is widely believed that Ali Taziev's tactical successes on the battlefield are fruits of his time spent as an Ingush Interior Ministry Policeman, from 1996 to 1998 before he disappeared with his partner, and the wife of a local politician they were tasked with protecting.