Tanks in the Soviet Union on Tajbeg Palace began; as planned, president Hafizullah Amin was killed. The Soviet military command at Termez, Uzbek SSR, announced on Radio Kabul that Afghanistan had been liberated from Amin's rule. According to the Soviet Politburo they were complying with the 1978 "Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Good Neighborliness" and Amin had been "executed by a tribunal for his crimes" by the Afghan Revolutionary Central Committee. That committee then elected as head of government former Deputy Prime Minister Babrak Karmal, and said that it had requested Soviet military assistance. Soviet ground forces, under the command of Marshal Sergei Sokolov, entered
Babrak Karmal for a revolution... I knew that people would not support us if we decided to keep power without such support. For unknown reasons, Karmal was invited back to Kabul by Najibullah, and "for equally obscure reasons Karmal accepted", returning on June 20, 1991. If Najibullah's plan was to strengthen his position within the Watan Party (the renamed PDPA) by appeasing the pro-Karmal Parchamites, he failed - Karmal's apartment became a center for opposition to Najibullah's government. When Najibullah was toppled in 1992, Karmal became the most powerful politician in Kabul through leadership of the Parcham. However, his negotiations with the