Mohammad Yaqoob blames US for Taliban’s lack of recognition
Yaqoob
Ariana: Mujahid also called on the US to stop violating Afghanistan’s airspace because the Islamic Emirate has pledged not to allow Afghanistan’s territory to be used against another country. He said that the Islamic Emirate has also asked Pakistan not to allow anyone to violate Afghanistan’s airspace through its territory. On Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, Mujahid said that the group is not present in Afghanistan, nor is the Islamic Emirate funding it. Click here to read more (external link).
How Afghan women secretly learn judo — over WhatsApp
Al Jazeera: A martial arts coach and his former student are training women in Afghanistan virtually from Norway. Click here to read more (external link).
Iran FM Claims Daesh Leaders Coming to Afghanistan
Tolo News: Amir Hossein Abdollahian, Iran’s foreign minister, claimed that leaders and fighters of Daesh have recently moved to Afghanistan from Iraq, Syria and parts of Libya. Abdollahian said that the shifting of the Daesh leaders to Afghanistan has become one of the main challenges ahead of the interim Afghan government. Click here to read more (external link).
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Audit fails to win U.S. backing for release of Afghan central-bank funds
Ariana: A U.S. funded audit of Afghanistan’s Islamic Emirate-run central bank has failed to win Washington’s backing for a return of bank assets from a $3.5 billion Swiss-based trust fund, said two U.S. officials and a former U.S. official, a move that would help ease the country’s financial crisis, Reuters reported. The audit has not changed the U.S. Treasury’s view that the bank must make reforms before the department will support disbursements from the Afghan Fund to Da Afghanistan Bank (DAB), said a U.S. Treasury official on condition of anonymity. Click here to read more (external link).
Tolo News in Dari – July 21, 2023
Tobias Ellwood Faced No-Confidence Motion For Praising Taliban
Tobias Ellwood
Khaama: Tobias Ellwood, the chairman of the commons defence select committees in the UK parliament, is facing motion after he shared a video praising the Taliban for improving security in Afghanistan. Ellwood tried to end the controversy by apologizing for his “poor communication” after his actions infuriated members of his party and veterans. Click here to read more (external link).
Afghan Resistance Leader Says US Diverted Attention From Afghanistan To Ukraine
Massoud
Sputnik: The United States diverted its attention from Afghanistan to Ukraine and other places after the Taliban takeover in 2021 just like it did after September 11 when it reallocated resources to invade Iraq, National Resistance Front (NRF) of Afghanistan Leader Ahmad Massoud said during a virtual panel hosted by the Aspen Institute. “Unfortunately, once again, the attention from Afghanistan has been diverted to Ukraine and different areas,” Massoud said on Thursday. Click here to read more (external link).
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US Body Reports ‘Horrific Information’ About UN Operations in Afghanistan
John Sopko
Akmal Dawi
VOA News
July 20, 2023
A U.S. watchdog says it has disclosed to Congress information about diversion and control of international humanitarian assistance by de facto Taliban authorities in Afghanistan.
“We have just uncovered, as part of our response to the House Foreign Relations Committee, some really horrific information about the problems with the U.N. operations in Afghanistan,” John Sopko, Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR), told an event at King’s College London on Thursday.
Sopko did not offer more details about his findings saying the foreign relations committee had tasked SIGAR to investigate and report to it whether U.S. aid to Afghanistan benefited the Taliban.
“A lot of congressmen are torn in this conundrum between giving humanitarian assistance to Afghans who are suffering versus how much of that [aid] is going to a regime which we hate,” said Sopko.
United Nations officials have not yet responded to VOA questions sent Thursday about what they know about diverted aid.
The Taliban are under U.S. sanctions that date back decades when the group was first in power over much of Afghanistan in the 1990s.
After spending over $146 billion on reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan between 2002 and 2022, the United States government suspended all development aid to the country following Taliban’s return to power in August 2021.
The Taliban deny they are interfering in humanitarian programs and accuse the U.S. and other Western donors of politicizing aid to Afghanistan.
However, the Islamist regime has imposed gender-based restrictions on aid activities denying Afghan women’s work for the U.N. and other non-government organizations – a move globally condemned as misogynistic.
Meanwhile, the U.N. says there continue to be many incidents of interference involving U.N. aid workers.
“118 gender-related incidents were recorded, with some 97 percent attributed to the de facto authorities and involving, inter alia, interference with programming, incidents at checkpoints, threats against humanitarian workers, assets and facilities, and mahrams [male escorts] required for movement of female staff,” the U.N. Special Representative for Afghanistan reported to the Security Council last month.
The U.N. has reported progress in reducing risks of fraud and diversion of funds in Afghanistan but has not given more details.
Robust funding
The United States, even while enforcing sanctions on the Taliban, has maintained humanitarian funding to Afghanistan amounting to about $2 billion since August 2021.
Despite a reported drop in donors’ response to the U.N. humanitarian appeal for Afghanistan, the United States remains at the top of the donors’ list with over $336 million contribution so far this year. Last year, the United States contributed over $1.26 billion to the U.N. appeal.
As of July 20, only 23% of this year’s Afghanistan appeal has been funded, according to the U.N.
Aid agencies have warned that a lack of funding to the appeal will force millions of vulnerable Afghan households into extreme poverty.
Citing North Korea and Syria, among other countries, John Sopko said in the past “we in the United States held our nose and delivered assistance to people around the world who live under governments we hate.”
Last month, the U.S. Department of States announced an additional $920 million in humanitarian assistance for the people of Syria taking the total U.S. assistance to the country since 2011 to $16.8 billion.
SIGAR said a new proposed draft law, which was passed by the House and under consideration by the Senate, will prohibit any U.S. assistance going “directly or indirectly” to the Taliban. Sopko predicted the bill, if passed, would have “serious implications” for aid to Afghanistan.
British Lawmaker Deletes Video Lauding Taliban Rule in Afghanistan
Tobias Ellwood
Ayaz Gul
VOA News
July 20, 2023
ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN — A senior British member of parliament deleted a video Thursday praising the Taliban’s rule in Afghanistan and apologized for what he said was the outcome of his “poor communication.”
Tobias Ellwood of the Conservative Party released the video commentary Wednesday on Twitter after his trip to the war-ravaged South Asian nation last week.
He argued in his now-deleted video that the security situation in Afghanistan had “vastly improved” since the Taliban returned to power two years ago.
Ellwood added that “corruption is down,” and the Taliban have almost eliminated the opium trade. He recorded his comments in the southern Afghan province of Helmand, one of the world’s largest opium poppy producers.
“This is a very different country indeed — it feels different now since the Taliban have returned to power,” he said. Ellwood urged Britain to re-engage with the Taliban and reopen its embassy in Kabul.
His video sparked outrage and prompted fellow members to move to seek his ouster as chairman of the House of Commons Defense Select Committee.
“I’m very, very sorry that my reflection of my visit could have been much better worded and have been taken out of context,” Ellwood said Thursday in his statement on Twitter after deleting the video.
Taliban chief spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid retweeted the video Thursday, calling it a “positive report.” But he, too, later deleted the tweet without explaining.
British media quoted Mark Francois, a defense committee member, telling the House of Commons on Wednesday that the video was “utterly bizarre” and advising Ellwood to be “very careful” in expressing his views.
“Tobias Ellwood’s video could have been issued by the Afghan tourist board,” Jacob Rees-Mogg, a British member of parliament, said in a sarcastic Twitter comment.
On Thursday, Ellwood appeared to defend some of his remarks in the controversial video, including criticism of the British government for not engaging directly with the Taliban, saying, “our current strategy of shouting from afar, after abruptly abandoning the country in 2021” was not working.
“However well-intentioned, reflections of my personal visit could have been better worded,” he said.
“I stand up, speak my mind, try to see the bigger picture, and offer solutions, especially on the international stage, as our world turns a dangerous corner. I don’t always get it right,” the lawmaker added.
“My simple call to action was to see our embassy reopen again and pursue a more direct strategy to help the 40 million people that we abandoned,” Ellwood said.
The Taliban regained control of Afghanistan in August 2021 when the United States and other Western allies withdrew all their troops after almost two decades of involvement in the war.
The fundamentalist de facto rulers have since introduced their strict interpretation of Islamic law or Sharia, squeezing women out of public life and placing an indefinite ban on girls’ education beyond the sixth grade. The restrictions on Afghan women and other human rights concerns have kept the international community from granting legitimacy to Taliban rule.
Taliban leaders defend their government, saying it is aligned with the Afghan culture and Sharia.
A U.S. State Department spokesman told reporters Wednesday that “we are not reconsidering opening an embassy at this point” in Afghanistan. He was responding to a question about Ellwood’s video.
“We have always made clear to the Taliban that there are certain steps that we expect them to take if they want to gain any form of international legitimacy, which they are a long way from reaching, if at all possible,” Matthew Miller said and denounced as “abhorrent” curbs the Taliban have placed on Afghan women and girls.
“We strongly object to those steps, and of course, we know that others in the international community take note, and they consider those in assessing their relationship with their government.”
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