Ashraf Ghani
Ashraf Ghani via Foreign Affairs: President Joe Biden’s decision to withdraw the remaining 2,500 U.S. troops from Afghanistan by September represents a turning point for the country and our neighbors. The Afghan government respects the decision and views it as a moment of both opportunity and risk for itself, for Afghans, for the Taliban, and for the region. Click here to read more (external link).
Tolo News: On Wednesday, the Ministry of Public Health reported 365 new positive cases of COVID-19 out of 1,993 samples tested in the last 24 hours. The ministry reported that the cumulative total of known COVID-19 cases is 61,162, the total number of reported deaths is 2,664, and the total number of recoveries is 53,750. Click here to read more (external link).
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
May 4, 2021
Thousands of people have fled their homes in Afghanistan’s southern province of Helmand as Afghan security forces fought back a large-scale offensive after the United States began to pull its forces from the war-torn country.
Provincial council head Attaullah Afghan said on May 4 that the Taliban launched an ample offensive the previous day, attacking checkpoints around the outskirts of the regional capital of Lashkar Gah, taking over some of them.
The Afghan army launched air strikes and deployed elite commando forces to the area and the insurgents had been pushed back but fighting was continuing on May 4, Afghan added.
About 1,000 families were forced to flee their homes to escape the fighting, and took refuge in Lashkar Gah, the province’s director for refugees said.
“Many who still have not found shelter in the city need urgent assistance,” according to Sayed Mohammad Rami.
Although the United States did not meet the May 1 withdrawal deadline agreed in talks with the Taliban last year, it did begin to pull its forces on that date after President Joe Biden announced all troops will leave by September 11.
The decision was criticized by some, who argue that the militants will try to sweep back into power.
As part of the pullout, U.S. forces handed over a base in Helmand to Afghan troops two days ago.
The Afghan Defense Ministry said more than 100 Taliban fighters had been killed in the fighting in Helmand. It did not provide details on casualties among Afghan security forces.
It also said that government troops have been responding to attacks by the Taliban in at least six other provinces, including southeastern Ghazni and southern Kandahar, in the past 24 hours.
The Taliban did not immediately respond to request for comment.
The May 1 deadline for U.S. troops to pull out was agreed last year under former President Donald Trump. The Taliban rejected Biden’s announcement that troops would instead withdraw over the next four and a half months.
The news of the militants’ offensive came a day after the Pentagon dismissed what it called “small harassing attacks” on withdrawing international forces.
“What we’ve seen are some small harassing attacks over the course of the weekend that have not had any significant impact, certainly not on our people or our resources there and bases,” Pentagon spokesman John Kirby told reporters on May 3.
U.S. generals have expressed concerns in recent weeks that the pullout might lead to the collapse of the Afghan government or a new civil war, despite reassurances by Afghan President Ashraf Ghani who insisted last week that government forces were “fully capable” of keeping militants at bay.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in London on May 3 that the United States was “not disengaging” and that “we intend to sustain our assistance” to Afghanistan despite the pullout.
With reporting by Reuters, AFP, and TOLOnews.com
Related
Ariana: One-in-three Afghans are acutely food insecure, according to the latest Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) assessment report released by the Afghan government and its partners on Tuesday. According to the IPC report, food insecurity in Afghanistan is attributed to the lingering impact of COVID-19, armed conflict, a rise in food prices, high unemployment rates and income loss, and the start of the complex and recurrent La Niña weather event. Click here to read more (external link).
Tolo News: Officials said 44 residents of Badakhshan’s Pamir area left the mountainous region in Afghanistan’s northeast and obtained Kyrgyzstan citizenship. They are seeking a better life by leaving their native living style, officials said. Pamir residents said they have been ignored by governments over the last several decades. Click here to read more (external link).
Related
Tolo News: The Ministry of Public Health on Tuesday reported 234 new positive cases of COVID-19 out of 2,078 samples tested in the last 24 hours. The ministry reported that the cumulative total of known COVID-19 cases is 60,563, the total number of reported deaths is 2,648, and the total number of recoveries is 53,561. Click here to read more (external link).
Ayaz Gul
VOA News
May 3, 2021
ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN – The United Nations said Monday that opium cultivation in conflict-ridden Afghanistan increased by 37% in 2020 compared to the previous year, potentially producing an estimated 6,300 tons of opium.
The findings are part of a new survey the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) conducted in coordination with the Afghan National Statistics and Information Authority (NSIA).
The survey came two days after the United States and NATO allies formally began pulling their troops from Afghanistan, a move intended to close nearly 20 years of international military engagement in the country.
“The total area under opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan was estimated at 224,000 hectares in 2020, which represents an increase of 37%, or 61,000 hectares, when compared to 2019.”
The survey noted the area under cultivation in 2020 was among the four highest ever measured in Afghanistan.
Poppy cultivation has increased in most regions of the country, with 22 out of 34 Afghan provinces growing the opium poppy last year, decreasing the number of poppy-free provinces from 13 to 12 when compared to 2019.
Afghanistan’s southwestern region, as usual, accounted for 71% of total opium production, while cultivation in the eastern region had reduced by 28%.
Southern Helmand province, which is mostly controlled or contested by Taliban insurgents, remained the country’s major opium poppy cultivating province.
U.N. officials say rule of law-related challenges such as political instability, corruption, instability, and insecurity caused by insurgency groups are among the main factors driving high levels of opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan.
Socioeconomic factors also impact farmers’ decisions — for example, scarce employment opportunities, lack of quality education and limited access to markets.
Surveyors used satellite imagery to estimate opium poppy yields because the coronavirus pandemic prevented them from collecting opium data in the field.
“This is a demonstration on how NSIA, together with UNODC, we are able to find innovative solutions and to overcome the challenges and still present to the international community the results of the survey,” noted Angela Me, chief of the UNODC statistics and survey section.
The COVID-19 crisis did not affect the 2020 opium season in terms of area cultivated or labor available for harvesting.
The survey, however, cautioned and expected that the economic downturn following the pandemic, in combination with increasing food prices, may lead to further increases in opium poppy cultivation in future years.
A U.S. government agency reported to U.S. Congress in January that Washington has appropriated $9 billion for counternarcotics efforts in Afghanistan since 2002.
However, the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) said the opium economy had grown exponentially over the period, while interdiction efforts have had “only a minimal impact” on the illicit narcotics trade.
“Importantly, that trade helps fund insurgents, terrorists and criminal networks; fosters corruption; undermines public regard for the government and creates public health and social problems,” SIGAR said.
In 2017, opium production in Afghanistan increased 87% to a record 9,000 metric tons, according to the UNODC. Afghan opiate production accounts for more than 80% of the global morphine and heroin seized.
ISIS trainees
Roshan Noorzai
VOA News
May 3, 2021
The Afghan government said it plans to begin talks with 14 countries to discuss what to do with hundreds of their citizens who have been captured while fighting alongside the Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP).
Ahamd Zia Saraj, the head of Afghanistan’s intelligence agency, National Directorate of Security (NDS), said this week that his government wanted to “find an acceptable solution to the problem.”
The foreign nationals in Afghan custody are 408 ISKP members, including 173 women and children. According to the Afghan government, 299 of them are from Pakistan, 37 from Uzbekistan, 16 from China, 13 from Tajikistan, 12 from Kyrgyzstan, five from Russia, five from Jordan, five from Indonesia, four from India, four from Iran, three from Turkey, two from Bangladesh and two from Maldives.
Abdul Wahid Taqat, a former senior intelligence official in the Afghan government, predicted a ‘difficult’ legal and political process for the repatriation of the ISKP prisoners, saying Kabul will likely need to use international bodies to convince those countries take back their citizens.
“Returning these fighters would not be easy because Afghanistan has no treaties to extradite or exchange terrorists with most of these countries,” Taqat told VOA, adding that “a reasonable option for Afghanistan is to involve the United Nations Human Commission on Human Rights to find a solution.”
Most of the countries are hesitant to take back their citizens who have joined terror groups because of legal and security risks these “dangerous individuals” pose, said Colin Clarke, a senior fellow at the Soufan Center.
Clarke, however, said that some countries will likely be more responsive to the Afghan government request.
“More authoritarian countries do not need the proof; countries that are more transparent will need it to prosecute [these individuals],” he said. He added that China has interest in taking back its citizens back because it has “inflated the threat of terrorism to justify their treatment of Uyghurs.”
Reuters reported in 2015 that the Afghan government arrested and handed over a number of Uyghur militants to China as a way to persuade China to help with convincing Pakistan to bring the Taliban to the negotiating table.
Formidable threat
Taqat said the Afghan government’s announcement shows that foreign fighters still have bases in the country and that their presence would remain a “formidable threat” after foreign troops leave.
The fighters “will pose a greater threat to the security and stability of Afghanistan after the U.S. withdrawal,” said Taqat.
The U.S. and its NATO allies have announced that they will pull out all their forces from Afghanistan by September 11.
The Islamic State branch, ISKP, was formed in January 2015 in the eastern provinces of Afghanistan and in northern Pakistan. The group has suffered major setbacks in recent years, including the loss of its key pockets of territory and the removal of its top leadership.
Despite the losses, a U.N. report in May 2020 said that ISKP still has about 2,200 armed fighters in the South Asian country and remains capable of launching different attacks.
Pakistani citizens
During the announcement Tuesday, NDS’s chief Saraj said that 299 out of 208 ISKP prisoners were Pakistani citizens because “60% of Daesh fighters are Pakistanis.”
Daesh is an Arabic acronym for the Islamic State.
Saraj said Aslam Farooqi, an ISKP leader and Pakistani citizen, will be turned over to Pakistani authorities only in exchange for Taliban leadership.
“We would only hand him over to Pakistan if we agree on a mutual exchange. When Pakistan hands over some Taliban leaders to us, we will think about it.”
Farooqi was arrested with a dozen other ISKP fighters in April 2020 in the southern Kandahar province.
Earlier this month, Pakistan demanded that Afghanistan hand over Farooqi to Pakistan.
“Aslam Farooqi was involved in anti-Pakistan activities in Afghanistan, he should be handed over to Pakistan for further investigation,” Pakistan’s foreign office said in a statement.
Regional observers say that most of ISKP fighters were the alienated members of the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) who joined the terror group after it was formed in 2015.
The Afghan government said that in addition to the ISKP fighters, it is holding an additional 309 foreign fighters who are affiliated with al-Qaeda and other militant groups.
Ariana: At least three people have died in flash floods in northern Samangan province, local officials said Monday. Abdul Munir Rahimi, a spokesman for Samangan police, told Ariana News that flash floods swept through Shabashak village in Dara Soaf Bala district of the province on Sunday night. Click here to read more (external link).