Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty August 19, 2021 U.S. President Joe Biden says he doesn’t believe the Taliban has changed and the militant group is now going through an “existential crisis” about whether it wants legitimacy on the global stage after seizing power in Afghanistan. When asked in an ABC interview that aired on August 19
VOA News August 19, 2021 Taliban fighters captured major areas in quick succession on their way to seizing Afghanistan’s capital, Kabul, Sunday, 20 years after U.S.-led forces knocked the group from power. Here are some of its key leaders. Mawlawi Haibatullah Akhundzada He is the Taliban’s supreme leader, a position he took following the death
Jamie Dettmer VOA News August 19, 2021 The Taliban has placed security for the Afghan capital, Kabul, in the hands of senior members of the Haqqani Network, which has close ties with foreign jihadist groups including a long-standing association with al-Qaida. Western intelligence officials say the assignment is alarming and undercuts Taliban promises to tread
CBS News: Afghan taekwondo athlete Zakia Khudadadi was supposed to be on her way to the Tokyo Paralympics and become her country’s first ever female participant in the Games. Instead, as the Taliban have taken control of Afghanistan, the 23-year-old tells CBS News she and her family are living a “nightmare.” Click here to read
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty August 19, 2021 Casualties were reported as Afghan demonstrators waving the national flag took to the streets of several cities to mark the country’s Independence Day in the first major display of popular opposition to the Taliban, a day after at least one person was killed when the hard-line Islamist militants
Afghan students enrolled in Indian colleges and universities worry about the future that their country holds for them following the Taliban takeover there. India has a large Afghan student community, with most having come on scholarships offered by the Indian government as a goodwill gesture to promote education in the country. Anjana Pasricha spoke
Daily Beast: The ousted Afghan President Ashraf Ghani said he fled to the United Arab Emirates to avoid being killed by the Taliban, who allegedly promised they wouldn’t enter Kabul. Ghani made his first remarks Wednesday with a video posted on his Facebook page. “If I had stayed in Afghanistan, the people of Afghanistan would
Frud Bezhan Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty August 18, 2021 Prominent female news presenter Shabnam Dawran is one of Afghanistan’s most recognizable faces. But after the Taliban’s takeover of the Afghan capital on August 15, she was promptly fired along with all her female colleagues. A Taliban militant flanked by a white Taliban flag took her
By Golnaz Esfandiari Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty August 18, 2021 Iranian officials are carefully weighing their options after the surprisingly swift Taliban takeover of Afghanistan amid fears of instability, a refugee influx, and extremist groups such as Islamic State (IS) gaining a permanent foothold in its eastern neighbor. Tehran, which has cultivated loose ties with the
Bruce Pannier Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty August 18, 2021 The events that the governments of Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan have been increasingly dreading in recent weeks have begun to happen. The Afghan government has fallen to the Taliban and despite the Central Asian governments having had years to contemplate and plan for such an occurrence,