He was assassinated by Afghan mujahideen insurgents in September 1980, whilst he was partaking in a negotiation process with tribal leaders for a peaceful solution to the Soviet-Afghan War.

Faiz Muhammad was born in 1939 to an ethnic Pashtun family, belonging to the Mahsud tribe in South Waziristan, when it was part of British India.

As a result of all the knowledge he gained from being under the tutelage of officers in the Soviet Airborne Forces, he was eligible to hold the post of head of the Operation Department of one of the elite 444th Commando Paratrooper Battalion.

[2] For leading the commando battalion during the coup into the Arg Presidential Palace and Kabul International Airport, Faiz was promoted to Major and a year later, he became a Lieutenant Colonel after passing the rank of Senior Captain.

[4] According to the official report, Maiwandwal committed suicide while being imprisoned although it was widely believed he was tortured to death by Parchamites who had control of the Ministry of Interior as he was a staunch anti-leftist, therefore a threat to the PDPA.

In contrast to Faiz gaining various new positions after the 1973 Republican coup d’état, the PDPA's Khalq faction-aligned government only appointed him as the Afghan ambassador to Iraq.

In his role, he led the process of establishing relations with Pashtun tribal leaders who had a negative attitude towards the regime due to the Marxist policies of the Khalq government and its draconian practices of torturing dissidents.