A Poisoned Luncheon in the Presidential Palace

All this time President Amin was lying half-conscious in the palace, incapacitated by KGB agents. Around one o’clock that day, Amin, with a number of his leading party and government officials, had been poisoned when consuming a special luncheon that the palace had arranged in honor of Ghulam Dastagir Panjsheri, a member of the central committee of the party. Panjsheri had returned from a long trip to the Soviet Union. Although not on good terms with Amin, Panjsheri had told him that he had brought good tidings and wished to discuss them with him and other comrades. Since Panjsheri was the only one who did not consume the poisoned food, he was suspected. Some kind of light poison had been mixed with the soup and ashak (a special Afghan dish) served by two Russian girls who were working as waitresses in the palace. Also, “a number of Afghan leaders were arrested at a Soviet-hosted reception staged at the Intercontinental Hotel.…Similarly, Afghan army liaison officers were isolated at a reception party.”^[4]

The chief cook of the palace was Michail Talebov, a native of Soviet Azerbaijan, who, as a lieutenant colonel, was in the pay of the KGB.^[5] He had been employed at the urging of Soviet advisers. Amin was unwilling to have either the waitresses or the cook, but his Soviet comrades had told him that because his personal safety was a matter of utmost significance, these persons were necessary to perform such sensitive jobs. Amin was still reluctant to accept the advice. At last he acquiesced, but he made it known that they were welcome only until he found some trustworthy Afghan employees.

At the time of the attack Amin was conscious but groggy. After the effects of the poisoning had been felt, a team of physicians, including an old Russian physician from the Four-Hundred-Bed Hospital, began treating Amin. The hospital, which had been built with Russian funds, was the most modern hospital in Afghanistan. The physicians and nurses were still in the palace when it came under fire. Because the communication lines had been cut, Amin did not know what was happening.