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Qazi Abdul Hai Khadem – Senator Qazi Abdul Hai Khadem, son of Murtaza, was born in 1956 in the village of Deh Surkh in Kohistanat district of Sar-e Pul province. He completed his primary education at the Hemat Primary School of Kohistanat in 1971, and his secondary education at Abu Hanifa School in Kabul in 1977. He was admitted to the Islamic law Faculty of Kabul University in 1978. Following the Communist coup in 1979, he fled to Pakistan where lived until 1981. As part of his religious duties, he re-entered Afghanistan in 1981 to join the armed resistance against the Soviets. He was subsequently captured by the Soviet puppet government and spent a year in the Sherpur Temporary Jail and at the Directorate of National Security. He was released in 1982, and again headed to the front lines in Jawzjan and Saripul provinces. He served in the Kohistanat front line until 1992. From 1992 to 1994, he served as the chief of staff in the 26th Jihadi Division in Saripul. In 1994, he was promoted to the rank of brigadier general by then-President Ustad Rabbani. In 2006, President Karzai awarded him with a Medal of Honor for Jihad and Resistance.