By Afghanland.com:

Mohammad Najibullah Ahmadzai
born 1947, Gardiz, Afghanistan
died September 27, 1996, Kabul
 

Dr. Mohammad Najibullah Ahmadzai was the fourth President of Afghanistan during the period of the communist Democratic Republic of Afghanistan.

Najibullah (meaning "Honored of God") was born in August 1947 to a moderately prosperous family belonging to the Pushtun Ahmadzai sub-tribe of the Ghilzai. Though his ancestral village was located between the towns of Said Karam and Gardez, capital of Pakhtia Province, Najibullah was born in Afghanistan's capital city, Kabul.

Najibullah's father, Akhtar Mohammad Khan, who died in 1983, served during the 1960s as the Afghani trade commissioner and consul in Peshawar, Pakistan

He was educated at Habibia High School and Kabul University, where he graduated with a degree in Medicine in 1975.

He joined the Parcham faction of the communist People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA) in 1965. and was jailed twice for his political activities and his stance  on abolition of feudal power in the countryside relaxed form of religion. He was for equal rights for women and various ethnic minorities and the release of more than 13,000 political prisoners

Despite being regarded as an intelligent man, he was referred to as Najib-e Gaw (the Bull) by his opponents due to his physique. He preferred the name Najib, and dropping the trailing Allah. The PDPA staged a successful coup in 1978, but the Khalq faction of the PDPA gained supremacy, and after a brief stint as ambassador in Tehran, Najibullah was dismissed from government and went into exile in Europe.

He returned to Kabul after the Soviet invasion in 1979. In 1980, he was appointed the head of KHAD, the secret police. KhAD is an abbreviation for Khedamat-e Etelea'at-e Dawlati, the Afghanistan Marxist regime's secret police, also known as the State Information Agency. Set up in 1980, and controlled by the KGB, this was a brutal agency specifically created for the suppression of Afghanistan Marxist regime's internal opponents.
 

Under Najibullah's control, it is claimed that KHAD arrested, tortured and executed tens of thousands of Afghans. He was known morst famously as "Najib e Gow" literaly meaning "Najib the Bull" Najibullah replaced Babrak Karmal as Afghanistan's President in 1986.
 

In 1986 Najibullah became general secretary of the PDPA and had a mild success against the mujahidin revolt. Afghanistan was undermined by the intrigues of the soviet government led by Gorbachov and his clique. Finally Gorbachov withdrew Soviet forces from Afghanistan  in 1989.

Najibullah's government survived for another three years. Eventually divisions within his own ranks, including the defection of General Abdul Rashid Dostam fatally weakened the government's resolve. Najibullah had
been working on a compromise settlement to end the civil war with Ahmad Shah Masood, brokered by
the United Nations. But talks broke down and the government fell.

Mojahidin forces entered Kabul in 1992. Najibullah tried to flee Kabul, but his departure was blocked by Abdul Rashid Dostum. Najibullah sought sanctuary in the UN compound in Kabul.

President Rabbani, refused to let him leave the country, but made no attempt to arrest him. Najibullah spent the rest of his days in virtual detention.

On September 27 1996 Taliban militiamen burst into the compound and dragged Najibullah to the presidential palace, where he was beaten and shot. His mutilated body, together with that of his brother, was then hung on street lamp posts outside the palace.