Afghan's ruler,
Shere Ali, signed a treaty with Russia, our rival in the Great Game as we called the struggle for control of Central Asia.
When the Indian viceroy, Lord Lytton (1831-91), learned that the emir, Shere Ali, had received a Russian envoy at Kabul, he despatched a mission to the emir which was stopped at the frontier.
But when Parliament reassembled, in February 1879, Disraeli was able to claim that the Afghan war was virtually at an end, for British troops had occupied Kandahar and the emir, Shere Ali, had fled from Kabul and soon died.
Born in Kabul (1844), the third son of Afzal Khan and the grandson of Dost Mohammed Khan; supported his father's and uncle's rebellion against his younger uncle
Shere Ali Khan after Dost Mohammed's death (1863); fled to Russian Turkestan after
Shere Ali's victory (1870); welcomed by the governor there, he stayed and studied the Russian administration; returned to Afghanistan to become emir at the end of the Second Afghan War (1880); proclaimed emir in Kabul (July 22, 1880) to great popular acclaim; pacified the country and forcefully reestablished his authority; negotiated permanent boundary lines with Russia (1887) and with British India (1893); died in Kabul (October 1, 1901).
When Afghan ruler
Shere Ali signed a treaty with our rival great power, Russia, Britain sent a mission to see him.