Photo: Akmal Dawi/IRIN
Ariana: The National Environmental Protection Agency (NEPA) says over the past month, the air quality in Kabul city has deteriorated and become more polluted. NEPA officials said that the lack of electricity, extensive use of unrefined coal and burning of plastic are major factors of air pollution in the capital. Kabul is one of the most polluted cities in the world. Click here to read more (external link).
Khaama: The Afghanistan Cricket Board (ACB) announced that the Afghanistan national U19 team will join a tri-series with India and host South Africa, enhancing international cricket participation. This series is set to take place in Johannesburg from December 29, 2023, to January 10, 2024, acting as a precursor to the ICC Men’s U19 Cricket World Cup 2024. The matches will be held at the Old Edwardians Cricket Club. Click here to read more (external link).
Heather Barr
Khaama: The head of the Women’s Rights Division at Human Rights Watch reacted to reports about the education of girls in religious schools, stating that these schools are not an ‘acceptable substitute’ for public schools. Heather Barr said it seems Roza Otunbayeva is ‘ready for a major and deeply harmful compromise’ in the absence of Afghan girls. This senior Human Rights Watch official added on the social media platform X that for a country whose children learn only ‘extremist teachings,’ there is no future. Previously, Roza Otunbayeva, the United Nations Special Representative in Afghanistan, had said that she had received ‘more evidence’ showing that more girls are being educated in religious schools. Click here to read more (external link).
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Ayaz Gul
VOA News
December 21, 2023
ISLAMABAD — The United States and human rights defenders Thursday renewed a call for Afghanistan’s ruling Taliban to allow female students to return to universities and ensure that women have access to education at all levels.
This week marks one year since the exclusively male Taliban government abruptly suspended women’s attendance in public and private higher education institutions, making impoverished Afghanistan the only country in the world to officially ban girls from education from grade seven onward.
Thomas West, the U.S. special representative for Afghanistan, called the yearlong university education ban “indefensible.”
He wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, that the crisis-hit South Asian nation “needs a generation of future female doctors, engineers, business leaders, educators to grow & prosper & stand on its own feet.”
“For the sake of Afghanistan’s future and our own interests in a stable region, we must keep women’s access to education at all levels at the very center of our priorities,” West added.
The Taliban returned to power in August 2021 and imposed their strict interpretation of Islamic law, placing sweeping restrictions on Afghan women’s access to education and work.
The Islamist rulers have dismissed international criticism of their policies, saying they are aligned with local culture and Islamic law.
Rina Amiri, the U.S. special envoy for Afghan women, girls, and human rights, questioned the Taliban’s claims Thursday and blasted de facto rulers for stripping half the country’s population of their basic rights.
“We must all stand firmly with the Afghan people, particularly women & girls, as they call on us to counter these policies and remember that they are not borne of Afghan culture, but of Taliban ideology,” Amiri wrote on X.
Taliban Higher Education Minister Nada Mohammad Nadim told a graduation ceremony for hundreds of male students at the main university in the Afghan capital, Kabul, that his government is committed to developing and progressing education in the country.
Nadim did not elaborate or discuss matters related to female higher education, which his ministry suspended last year.
“Foreigners offer suggestions for the development of Afghanistan; in reality, they do not want the country’s development,” the Taliban minister said in an apparent response to international criticism.
Canadian Women for Women in Afghanistan, a charitable organization, blamed what it called “gender apartheid policies” of the Taliban for directly contributing to worsening humanitarian conditions in the country, reeling from years of war and natural disasters.
The United Nations says nearly two-thirds of Afghans need food and other aid.
“Excluding half the population from accessing higher education is a grave abuse of human rights, but will also debilitate Afghanistan’s economic future by cutting off the supply of educated professionals the country needs not just to develop and advance, but just to function,” said Lauryn Oates, executive director of the organization.
“This, and other discriminatory policies, are taking the country backward and causing irreparable harm,” she added in the statement released in connection with the ban on female university education. It also invited Canadian and other foreign higher education institutions to open their doors to Afghan women.
Roza Otunbayeva, U.N. special envoy in the country, told a Security Council meeting Wednesday that her mission is seeking to verify reports that the Taliban are allowing girls of all ages to study at traditionally boys-only Islamic religious schools, known as madrassas.
The envoy said the United Nations is receiving “more and more anecdotal evidence” that girls can study at madrassas. “It is not entirely clear, however, what constitutes a madrassa, if there is a standardized curriculum that allows modern education subjects, and how many girls are able to study in madrassas,” Otunbayeva said.
She said Taliban education authorities “continue to tell us that they are working on creating conditions to allow girls to return to school. But time is passing while a generation of girls is falling behind.”
“The quality of education in Afghanistan is a growing concern. The international community has rightly focused on the need to reverse the ban on girls’ education, but the deteriorating quality of education and access to it is affecting boys as well,” Otunbayeva said.
She said the lack of progress in resolving human rights issues is a key factor behind the current impasse between the Taliban and other countries.
No nation has formally recognized the Taliban government, citing its harsh treatment of women and other human rights concerns. The U.N. has also turned down Taliban demands to allow their nominee to represent Afghanistan at the world body.
“Accepting and working to uphold the international norms and standards, as set out in the U.N. treaties that Afghanistan has ratified, will continue to be a nonnegotiable condition for a seat at the United Nations,” Otunbayeva told the Wednesday meeting.
Related
8am: Local sources have reported a disturbing incident involving the Taliban, who stand accused of shooting at Shamsuddin Bikzad, a former government soldier and current director of criminal affairs for the group’s security command in Samangan. The alleged reason for the attack was his supposed involvement in “harassing and tormenting people and engaging in gambling.” The Taliban have put forward accusations against Bikzad, claiming he abused official powers, harassed people, and engaged in gambling. In contrast, Baikzad’s associates dismiss these allegations as a mere “pretext,” asserting that the Taliban targeted him due to his previous military role. It is crucial to note that since the Taliban’s return to power, they have faced consistent allegations from human rights organizations, accusing them of detaining and killing former government soldiers. Click here to read more (external link).
Khaama: In a concerning move, the Taliban’s Ministry of Higher Education has issued a directive to private universities in Afghanistan to purge their libraries of non-Hanafi Islamic texts, including Shia and other minority religious books. This mandate represents an intensification of the Taliban’s effort to enforce a singular Sunni Hanafi Islamic perspective across educational institutions. The order not only demands the removal of these books but also their replacement with texts focused on the Prophet Muhammad’s biographies, underscoring the regime’s rigid interpretation of Islamic teachings. Click here to read more (external link).
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Akmal Dawi
VOA News
December 21, 2023
The de facto Taliban regime in Afghanistan has increased oil imports from Russia, rising from 246,000 tons in 2022 to more than 710,000 tons in the past 11 months, resulting in the expansion of oil trade to more than $300 million, according to Taliban officials.
The means by which the sanctions-burdened Taliban financial sector facilitates substantial payments from Afghanistan to Russia remains unclear.
International sanctions have limited banking transactions with Afghanistan since the Taliban took control in 2021.
The United States has granted exemptions to sanctions, primarily for humanitarian operations, on the condition that they do not benefit Taliban leaders and entities.
Last year, Taliban officials entered into a provisional agreement with Russia to import 1 million tons of gasoline, 1 million tons of diesel, and 500,000 tons of liquefied petroleum gas.
“While the Taliban and Russia are under separate Western sanctions, there is nothing that restricts their ability to trade with each other outside of the U.S. and Western financial systems and jurisdictions,” Kimberly Donovan, director of Economic Statecraft Initiative at the Wilson Center, told VOA.
The U.S. has not imposed sanctions on Russian oil exports, but Washington and its European allies have implemented a price cap on Russian oil sales, aiming to reduce Russia’s revenues for its war in Ukraine.
“The oil price cap is a mechanism to allow Russian crude oil and petroleum products to continue flowing on global markets while reducing the revenue that goes to fund Putin’s war,” a spokesperson for the U.S. Department State told VOA in written comments.
Russia’s oil exports to Afghanistan are deemed insignificant, considering that the country’s net oil revenues surpassed $11 billion only in October.
Regional trade
Under the Taliban, Afghanistan’s economy experienced a 25% contraction as foreign development assistance ceased, and no growth is anticipated this year, according to the World Bank.
Despite international isolation, the Taliban has sustained robust trade relations with several countries in the region. Imports from January to October 2023, totaling more than $6.3 billion, were 25% higher than last year.
While relations between Islamabad and Kabul have recently deteriorated because of refugee expulsions and security concerns, Pakistan has remained Afghanistan’s top trading partner, with Pakistan’s exports to its neighbor exceeding $1.37 billion this year.
In November Afghanistan’s exports were valued at $227 million, with imports standing at $681 million, as reported by a Taliban official to local Tolonews TV.
Food items and coal are noted as Afghanistan’s primary exports to various countries.
“Coal exports reached $252 million in the past 11 months,” Abdul Salaam Jawad, a spokesperson for Afghanistan’s Ministry of Commerce, said in a short video posted on X.
One Afghan factory, Jawad said, exported 60 tons of raisins to Russia.
Russia’ ambiguity
Moscow and Beijing have both maintained diplomatic and trade relations with Afghanistan, but Russia alone has hosted some anti-Taliban figures advocating for the removal of Taliban regime.
“Russia’s general policy toward the Taliban seems to be ambivalent, keeping all doors open,” Thomas Ruttig, an expert with Afghanistan Analysts Network, wrote to VOA in an email.
“Russia’s relations with the Taliban are not so much about Afghanistan, or the Taliban. It is rather one element in the global competition between the U.S./the West and Russia and China.”
During a meeting on Afghanistan at the United Nations Security Council on Wednesday, Russian representative Vasily Nebenzya said the Taliban prevented the collapse of the country in the aftermath of the U.S. withdrawal in 2021.
However, the Russian diplomat expressed concerns about the risks of terrorism emanating from a Taliban-ruled Afghanistan.
“It is clear that in order to fully eliminate the terrorists, what is being done by the Taliban is not enough while risks of spillover to Central Asia remain very real,” he said.
While Nebenzya called for humanitarian assistance for the Afghan people, Russia has not contributed to a U.N.-led Afghanistan humanitarian appeal this year, which remains 60% underfunded. In contrast, the United States has contributed more than $370 million to the appeal.
Some information for this article came from Reuters.
Ariana: After a thrilling 2023 that was packed full of exciting sporting events, Ariana Television Network is thrilled to announce yet another treat that will soon be broadcast to cricket fans around the country. This time it’s Afghanistan’s three-match T20I tour to India that will be screened live and exclusively on Ariana Television. The series will start on January 11 and end on January 17. Last month, the Afghanistan Cricket Board (ACB) confirmed the series and said: “The three T20I matches are scheduled for the 11th, 14th & 17th of January.” Click here to read more (external link).