Chris Mason via The National Interest: One year ago, I wrote in these pages that the war in Afghanistan was not over. As many as 5,000 Afghan soldiers who the United States trained were still fighting in Panjshir Province, the last redoubt against the Taliban takeover of the country in August 2021, and I said
The National Interest: The Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan in August 2021 came as a surprise to many. At the regional level, it raised concerns about Pakistan’s role in Afghanistan and its continuing relationship with the Taliban. Pakistan’s use of Afghanistan as a proxy to maintain its influence has been of particular interest to India, which
Michael Hughes: Afghanistan’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) plummeted by 40 percent overnight in the wake of the Taliban seizure of Kabul on August 15, 2021 because the international community cut off the foreign aid that had propped up the country’s economy for years. Such an earth-shattering loss of revenue no nation could survive, let alone
TRT World: Factional rift and competing interests to move up the power ladder are among the key factors pushing the former insurgent group to the brink of implosion. There are four major divisions in the Taliban administration. The first is between the movements’ pragmatist and hardline leaders. The second division is between the Taliban fighters
Nathan J. Robinson and Noam Chomsky via Current Affairs: The 20-year war in Afghanistan is often spoken of as a well-intentioned failure. In fact, it was a major crime originating in bloodlust and an indifference to Afghan lives. The U.S. bears a major responsibility for the present suffering of Afghans and has an obligation to
M. Ashraf Haidari via The National Interest: On July 20, 2022, the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) released a report on “Human Rights in Afghanistan: 16 August 2021 – 15 June 2022.” The ten-month report covers a wide range of ongoing human rights violations in the country since August 2021 when the Taliban,
Michael Hughes: The U.S. and its allies are finding it difficult to effectively isolate the Taliban regime, especially in the face of pressure to help the people of Afghanistan amid the ongoing humanitarian crisis. Some factions from Washington to Brussels are doing their utmost to ensure the radical movement does not receive anywhere near the
8am: Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan, on the eve of the one-year anniversary of the Taliban rule over Afghanistan, is hosting an international meeting with the theme of “Security, Economic Growth, and Regional Connectivity of Afghanistan.” At this conference, 20 countries and international organizations, including the Taliban, are supposed to discuss matters of Afghanistan and
8am: Out of all the Taliban commanders leading the blood-shedding attacks against the people, Qari Fasehuddin, a Tajik ethnic affiliate commander of the Taliban has been leading most of the attacks on his own people more than any other Taliban commander and his bosses. Fasehuddin’s mystery behind his cruelty against his own countrymen is a
Michael Hughes: The agenda item during talks between the U.S. and Taliban in Doha this week was widely expected to be about potentially unfreezing Afghan assets for earthquake recovery efforts. Although that topic was discussed, the State Department said a “central focus” of the dialogue was the Taliban’s restrictions on Afghan women. This emphasis was