He is not known for being a mujahed in the 1980s Soviet invasion, but his father, Abdul Ghafar Barialai, is an extremely famous Pashto poet in southern Afghanistan and was killed during Taraki's rule.
[3] He was appointed foreign minister on 27 October 1999, replacing Mohammad Hasan Akhund, and remained in that position until the Taliban were deposed in late 2001.
[4] According to the BBC, in July 2001 Muttawakil was told by Tohir Yo'ldosh, leader of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, that al-Qaeda was planning to launch a huge attack within the United States.
He sent an envoy to meet a US diplomat in Peshawar, Pakistan, to warn of the plan and to urge the US to launch a military attack on al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, but US officials were skeptical about the information.
[6] According to the BBC, some rumors said he was trying to negotiate an end to the American aerial bombardment of Afghanistan and suggesting the Taliban hand over Bin Laden.
Muttawakil was reported to have had a 90-minute meeting with Lieutenant General Ehsan ul Haq, the head of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate.
[9] He reported that he had been held in American custody in Kandahar with about 300 other captives, including Wakil Ahmed Muttawakil, and two of his former deputies, Khirullah Khairkhwa, and Abdul Hai Mutmaen.
The BBC reported on October 8, 2003 that Muttawakil had recently been released from eighteen months of detention in Bagram, and had returned to his family's home in Kandahar.
[11] An article in the German publication Der Spiegel, on April 12, 2007, about the Taliban's former ambassador to Pakistan, Abdul Salam Zaeef, said he had moved into a "... handsome guest house, located in the dusty modern neighborhood Khosh Hal Khan.
[15] Muttawakil, former Taliban Ambassador to Pakistan Abdul Salem Zaeef and former Supreme Court Chief Justice Fazel Hadi Shinwari were among leading Afghan figures who met with King Abdullah.
In 1999, the UN Security Council established a sanctions regime to cover individuals and entities associated with Al-Qaida, Osama bin Laden and/or the Taliban.
[citation needed] On January 27, 2010, a United Nations sanctions committee removed him and four other former senior Taliban officials from this list, in a move favoured by Afghan President Karzai.