8am: Sources on Tuesday, September 20, speaking to Hasht-e Subh said that in a new move, the Taliban group removed the Persian signs of the departments of management, publications, information technology, procurement management, and several other departments and replaced them with Pashto and English signs. This is while 90% of the visitors to government offices in Herat are Persian speaking and they do not understand Pashto. In addition, the Taliban group has removed the word “Danishga = University” from the main signboard of the new building of Balkh University. These ethnicist moves of the Taliban have provoked reactions of the people across the country, calling on the Taliban to focus on fundamental issues instead of these marginal issues. Click here to read more (external link).
1TV Afghanistan Dari News – September 20, 2022
Evil Circles: The Release of Taliban’s Drug Lord Makes the Path to Liberate Afghanistan More Difficult
Bashir Noorzai
8am: Taliban officials have called the release of Haji Bashir Ahmad Noorzai, known as Haji Bashar, as a sign of American goodwill and a “new chapter in the relations” between the Taliban and the United States. Haji Bashar is known in the media and political circles as the godfather of Afghanistan’s drug mafia. It is said that Afghanistan’s drug lord has earned huge sums of money through managing drug production, processing and trafficking networks and financed an important part of the Taliban’s expenses. At the same time, Haji Bashar is accused of having ties with the intelligence agencies, and there are reports of his cooperation and close contact with the Americans between 2002 and his arrest in 2005. But what role can Haji Bashar, who has been away from the drug market and politics for more than 17 years, play in the Taliban circle? Click here to read more (external link).
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Riveting ‘RETROGRADE’ Makes Warfare In Afghanistan Personal
popMATTERS: Matthew Heineman’s remarkable Retrograde—a National Geographic film showing at some festivals now and hitting theaters and streaming later this year—is one of the most unsettlingly intimate examples of this kind of filmmaking. Ostensibly, it’s a document of the last nine months of the Western-backed Afghanistan government in 2021. The film’s scope ranges from furious combat in the country’s dry opium-producing southwest to the chaotic end in Kabul when tens of thousands of Afghans scrambled to escape from the victorious Taliban. But while Heineman has produced an epic story, he tells it primarily through a small group of people caught up in the storm toss of history. Click here to read more (external link).
Use of Afghan Airspace By Intl Airlines Still Low: Officials
Tolo News: After more than a year since the change of government in Afghanistan, international aircraft crossing Afghanistan airspace–which provides revenue to the government–is still low, according to officials. The Ministry of Transportation and Civil Aviation said 70 to 90 aircraft cross Afghan airspace each 24 hours, which is much less than it was in the past. Click here to read more (external link).
Taliban Forcibly Displace Families in Dara Abdullah Khel and Confiscate their Properties
8am: Local sources in Panjshir report that the Taliban continue to force the residents of this province to leave their villages and loot the remaining properties of the residents. Reliable sources in a conversation with Hasht-e Subh say that the Taliban forced six families from the Dara Abdullah Khel district on Sunday, September 18 to leave their village. The Taliban have confiscated their properties, including food and supplies, according to the sources. Click here to read more (external link).
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‘Some days we eat grass’: families on the edge in Afghanistan’s food crisis – in pictures
The Guardian (UK): Drought, economic collapse and soaring food prices have pushed millions into hunger. Cash aid from the Disasters Emergency Committee is helping families feed their children and send them back to school. Click here to view photos (external link).
NRF Forces Attack a Taliban Outpost in Takhar Province
8am: The attack was carried out at 12:00 Sunday night (September 18th) on the Taliban outpost in the Chaman Khusda neighborhood of Takhar’s Farkhar district. Local sources in Farkhar say that this attack lasted for half an hour and inflicted casualties on the Taliban, but the exact number of Taliban casualties is still unknown. Click here to read more (external link).
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1TV Afghanistan Dari News – September 19, 2022
Taliban Free Last American Hostage in Afghanistan in Prisoner Swap
Bashir Noorzai
Ayaz Gul
VOA News
September 19, 2022
ISLAMABAD — The Taliban Monday freed Mark Frerichs, the only American hostage remaining in Afghanistan, in exchange for a Taliban drug lord, Bashir Noorzai, who was serving a life sentence in a U.S. prison.
Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi told reporters in Kabul the prisoner swap between his government and a U.S. delegation took place at the Afghan capital’s airport.
Frerichs, the nearly 60-year-old American engineer and Navy veteran, was abducted in Kabul in early 2020 when the U.S. and NATO troops were battling the then-Taliban insurgency in support of the Western-backed Afghan government.
In a statement, President Joe Biden said that Frerichs was on his way home from Afghanistan after 31 months in captivity there. Biden said he had spoken and shared the “good news” with Frerichs’ family.
“His release is the culmination of years of tireless work by dedicated public servants across our government and other partner governments, and I want to thank them for all that effort.,” Biden said.
“Bringing the negotiations that led to Mark’s freedom to a successful resolution required difficult decisions, which I did not take lightly.,” the U.S. president stated.
Biden said that his administration continues to prioritize the safe return of all Americans who are held hostage or wrongfully detained abroad, and the U.S. will not stop until they are reunited with their families.
Noorzai, known as Haji Bashir, was arrested in New York in 2005 and subsequently charged with trafficking millions of dollars’ worth of heroin into the United States. The top Taliban associate reportedly helped fund and arm the insurgents with proceeds from heroin trafficking.
Muttaqi described the prisoner swap as an “unprecedented in the history of Afghanistan” and said it was the outcome of a long negotiation process between the Taliban and the U.S. He said until now prisoner swaps between the two former adversaries would take place outside Afghanistan.
“This morning at 10 a.m. the American citizen was handed over to an American team at the Kabul airport and Haji Bashir was handed over to the Islamic Emirate,” Muttaqi said, using the official name for the Taliban government.
Noorzai’s lawyer had denied his client was a drug lord and argued the charges against him should be dismissed because U.S. officials duped him into believing he would not be arrested.
International forces completely withdrew from the country in August of last year after almost two decades of war with the Taliban, paving the way for the resurgent Islamist group to seize power.
Muttaqi said he also had a “positive” meeting with the U.S. officials at the Kabul airport on different issues before the guests left Afghanistan. He did not elaborate.
Muttaqi said Monday’s development had opened a “new chapter” in relations between Afghanistan and the United States, it would also help resolve bilateral problems between the two countries through negotiations.
Critics said it was too early to say whether the prisoner exchange would lead to any change in U.S. policy in terms of dealings with the Taliban, noting that the Islamist group had for long denied they were behind the abduction of Frerichs.
“Miraculously finding him for an exchange doesn’t exactly amount to diplomacy, nor trust building with the world,” said Torek Farhadi, a former Afghan official and political commentator.
The U.S. and the world at large have not yet recognized the Taliban government over human rights and terrorism-related concerns.
Noorzai, an influential tribal leader, owned opium fields in the southern province of Kandahar and he was a close ally of Mullah Mohammad Omar, the founder leader of the Taliban.
“In 2001, after the United States began military operations in Afghanistan, Noorzai at Omar’s request, provided the Taliban” with hundreds of his fighters to battle the then-anti-Taliban alliance of Afghan groups, according to the U.S. charge sheet against him.
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