India says Afghan embassy issue an ‘internal matter’

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Ariana: After reports of corruption and the move by the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (IEA) to take control of Afghanistan’s embassy in New Delhi, the Indian government has said the issue is an internal matter which does not involve them. Representatives of Afghan refugees living in India have accused officials at the Afghanistan embassy in Delhi, including the ambassador, of corruption. The embassy denies the allegations. Click here to read more (external link).

Taliban Transformed Seraj-ul-Emarat Palace into Jihadi Madrasa

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8am: Sources state that the Taliban had been attempting to convert this palace into a school over the past few months, and on Monday, June 4, they successfully accomplished this task. The Seraj-ul-Emarat Palace, constructed during the reign of King Amanullah Khan, underwent restoration during the previous government’s rule after being damaged during the country’s prolonged wars. Previously, the Taliban had converted the Sharia Faculty building of Panjshir University into a jihadi madrasa. Click here to read more (external link).

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Taliban to Relocate Refugees Settled Along Durand Line

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Zabihullah Mujahid

Tolo News: The Islamic Emirate’s [Taliban] spokesman, Zabiullah Mujahid, said that the move aims to assure Islamabad that the refugees are not involved in attacks against the Pakistani government. “To give a general assurance, the Islamic Emirate planned to take the refugees, who come from the other side of the Durand Line in Khost and Kunar provinces, to far provinces, so that they will be away from the (Durand) line … to show that they are not involved in the attacks that happen in Pakistan,” Mujahid said. However, it has yet to be clear which refugees will be included in the shift. Click here to read more (external link).

TTP launching attacks using Afghan soil, says Pakistan’s interior minister

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Ariana: Pakistan’s Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah has once again claimed that Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) is launching attacks against the country using Afghanistan’s soil.  “The position of the Afghan government is that they say we do not support Tehreek-e-Taliban against the government of Pakistan, but we have complaints about them, the people of this group enter Pakistan from Afghanistan; almost two months ago, they (Islamic Emirate) told us that we are moving them further away from the border so that they do not have access to attack Pakistan,” said Rana Sanaullah in an interview. Click here to read more (external link).

Dark Reign: Polio Spreading Rampantly under the Taliban Rule

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Taliban militant (file photo)

8am: The Taliban have turned Southeast Afghanistan and tribal areas of Pakistan into a polio-infected zone, providing refuge for the demon of poliovirus. This demon once declared defeated by the world, is regaining strength in these regions. In the previous year, there were two documented polio cases globally, both originating in Taliban-infiltrated areas: one in the tribal areas of Pakistan and the other in southeast Afghanistan. Should Taliban rule persist, diseases such as measles, smallpox, diphtheria, and tuberculosis may once again loom over the entire nation, claiming tens of thousands of lives annually.  Click here to read more (external link).

Progress Reported in Negotiations Over Iran-Afghanistan Water Dispute

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Roshan Noorzai
Zheela Noori
VOA News
June 2, 2023

WASHINGTON — After weeks of tensions over water rights to the Helmand River that escalated to a deadly clash last week, Iran says it has made progress in negotiations with Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers over the shared waterway.

On Thursday, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian told Iranian state media, the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting, that his government had “good negotiations” with the Taliban.

“We have the water rights issue on the agenda, and the [Iranian] president has assigned Hassan Kazemi Qomi [Iranian ambassador to Afghanistan] to follow up on the matter, with the view that the issues between the two countries should go in the direct direction and be resolved,” said Amir Abdollahian.

The tensions between Iran and the Taliban escalated after Iran accused the de facto government of Afghanistan of restricting the flow of water to Iran.

Deadly clashes between the two sides broke out last week in which two Iranian security forces and a Taliban guard were killed.

The tensions began last month after Iran President Ebrahim Raisi warned the Taliban to “honor” Iran’s rights over the Helmand River.

“We will not allow the rights of our people to be violated,” Raisi said during his visit to the southeastern Iranian province of Sistan and Baluchestan on May 18, adding that the Taliban should take his words “seriously.”

Afghanistan Acting Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi said that the Taliban were committed to the 1973 water treaty between Afghanistan and Iran. But he added that “the drought in Afghanistan and the region should not be overlooked.”

“It has become a completely political issue in both Afghanistan and Iran,” said Fatemeh Aman, a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute.

Longtime issue

Aman said the water dispute “existed, and it goes back over centuries.”

“The problem is that the issue just went away whenever there was enough rain or water. But the issue surfaced once there was a drought or lack of rain.”

In 1973, Iran and Afghanistan signed the Helmand River Water Treaty. According to the treaty, Afghanistan should provide 850 million cubic meters of water to Iran from the Helmand River in a “normal” year.

Kazemi Qomi said that despite the treaty, Iran has received only about 4 percent of its share of water.

The Helmand River, the longest river in Afghanistan, is about 1,150 kilometers (715 miles) long. Constituting over 40 percent of Afghanistan’s surface water, the river is an important source of livelihood for the country’s southern and southwestern provinces.

It feeds Hamun Lake in Iran’s Sistan and Baluchestan province, the province’s main water source.

Persistent droughts, climate change and a lack of proper water management have brought tensions over the transboundary waters between the two neighbors.

Although water security frictions are increasingly common for nations with shared waterways, it is unclear how much the dispute between Iran and Afghanistan could escalate.

Michael O’Hanlon, director of research at the Brookings Institution, told VOA that he did not expect tensions between Iran and Afghanistan to “boil into a larger problem for the region.”

“I think what you are looking at is really a question of how much will they cooperate on issues that they have a common interest in, like border control, counternarcotics, issues like that, where you could see the cooperation,” O’Hanlon said.

‘Complicated’ relations

During the civil war in Afghanistan in the 1990s, Iran supported the Afghan forces fighting against the Taliban, particularly after the Taliban killed nine Iranian diplomats in the northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif in 1998.

Iran cultivated closer relations with the Taliban before the fall of Kabul, as both sides were united in opposition to U.S. forces in the region.

While Iran has not recognized the Taliban as the legitimate government of Afghanistan, it has handed the Afghan Embassy in Tehran over to the group.

Despite close diplomatic ties, skirmishes over the border have been reported in recent years.

Ryan Crocker, a former U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan, told VOA that the relations between Iran and the Taliban “are very complicated.”

“The last thing that this region needs to see some kind of border war between Iran and Afghanistan,” he said.

This story originated in VOA’s Afghan Service.

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