Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
September 27, 2022
The UN General Assembly’s leaders’ meeting has concluded for a second year in a row without addresses from Afghanistan or Burma, both of whose representation is stuck in limbo after the toppling of UN-recognized governments in the past two years.
The United Nations has delayed actions on both the Afghan and Burmese leaderships’ bids for seats since December, with diplomats citing objectionable actions by those rulers.
The hard-line fundamentalist Taliban group has controlled most of Afghanistan since U.S.-led international troops and an elected government fled in August 2021, but remains unrecognized amid accusations of widespread rights abuses against women and minorities.
The Taliban-led government in Kabul has not been recognized by any country, which has complicated humanitarian efforts to help a desperately poor population of around 39 million hard-hit by decades of war.
The war in Ukraine, climate change, and food and fuel crises were some of the most frequent topics of speeches by leaders and other envoys to the 77th UN General Assembly’s General Debate on September 20-26.
Its declared theme under UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres was “A watershed moment: transformative solutions to interlocking challenges.”
Based on reporting by AP
8am: Local sources in Takhar report the intense clashes between the Taliban and the National Resistance Front (NRF) forces in this province. The clashes started on Monday night in Sayad village of Chal district and are still reportedly escalating. Recently, clashes between the two sides have escalated in Takhar province. In another report, four Taliban fighters were killed and injured two days ago following the attack of NRF forces in Khwaja Ghar district of this province. 
Tolo News: A number of Afghans who were recently sent back from Turkey accused the Turkish military of human rights violations and mistreatment. Zekrullah is one of the Afghan migrants sent back to Afghanistan by Turkish police. “I was at work, suddenly police came and took 50 people and me. We spent one week at camp, and after one week they deported us to Kabul,” said Zekrullah, a deportee. There were some other refugees with Zekrullah that have been deported to Kabul. 
8am: Sources in the visual media based in Kabul told Hasht-e Subh on Monday (September 26th) that the Taliban have imposed new restrictions on the presenters of TV programs. Based on reports, the Taliban have recently told the managers of media outlets that male and female presenters will not be able to run joint programs from now on. The Taliban have told the director of visual media in Kabul that the women’s interviews will be recorded and published with their faces covered. 
Bloomberg: Experts who follow the country say that after two decades of warfare, the Taliban haven’t managed to transition from insurgents to rulers. The government is run largely based on orders from spiritual leader Haibatullah Akhundzada, who rules from the Taliban birthplace in the Kandahar region bordering Pakistan. All of that is also giving China pause, said Raffaello Pantucci, a senior associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute in the UK.