Suicide blast rocks Kabul International cricket stadium during a T20 match

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OpIndia: A suicide blast rocked the Kabul International Cricket stadium during the Shpageeza Cricket League T20, an IPL-like tournament held in the Afghan capital. All players were rushed inside a bunker following the blast. Multiple casualties have been reported from the stadium. Social media websites are rife with videos of the attack that took place in the Kabul International Cricket stadium. Click here to read more (external link).

Iranian energy ministry delegation to visit Kabul over water rights

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Ariana: According to Iran’s IRNA news agency, Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian told Afghanistan’s acting Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi in a phone conversation that he is dispatching the delegation in the near future in order to resolve issues around water. Amirabdollahian said the people of Iran’s Sistan and Baluchestan and their representatives in Parliament are seriously demanding their share of water and that unless the issue is resolved quickly, “it will affect the other issues in bilateral cooperation negatively”, IRNA reported. According to IRNA, Muttaqi in turn welcomed the delegation’s upcoming visit and said Afghanistan is committed to giving Iran their share of water from the Helmand River, which flows into the country. Click here to read more (external link).

Afghanistan Food Program Faces Massive Funding Shortfall

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Akmal Dawi
VOA News
July 28, 2022

Afghanistan is again facing risks of mass starvation in coming months as critical relief operations suffer substantial funding shortfalls.

The World Food Program (WFP) says it faces a net funding shortage of $960 million to sustain humanitarian operations over the next six months.

“Funding shortfalls and skyrocketing prices mean WFP has been forced to take hard decisions earlier this year to cut down activities to the bare minimum from June to August, temporarily focusing assistance on 10 million people who face the most urgent and life-threatening needs,” Philippe Kropf, the WFP’s head of communication in Afghanistan, told VOA.

Almost 19 million Afghans – more than half of Afghanistan’s estimated population – are facing critical levels of hunger, aid agencies say.

Funding is urgently required to procure and stock relief supplies in parts of the landlocked country that become inaccessible during the winter.

“If we fail to secure funding and preposition food before winter starts in October, people will starve,” Kropf warned.

To avert starvation and death in the country, the U.N. asked donors for $4.4 billion earlier this year. As of July 28, less than 45% of the appeal has been funded.

The U.S., the largest humanitarian donor to Afghanistan, has pledged almost $460 million for the appeal, followed by the United Kingdom ($408 million) and Asia Development Bank ($380 million).

“I think for the United States, the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan is among the highest priorities that drive American decision making,” Thomas West, U.S. special envoy for Afghanistan, told Uzreport TV this week.

Millions malnourished

Almost five million children and pregnant and lactating women in Afghanistan face malnutrition this year, while 3.9 million children are already malnourished, aid agencies say.

“Malnutrition is a life-threatening illness, and if they don’t get treatment in time, severely malnourished children face a very real risk of death,” Sacha Myers, a spokesperson for Save the Children Afghanistan, told VOA.

While praising donors for giving almost $2 billion in humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan this year, aid workers say the country needs economic recovery and development aid to rid itself of recurring cycles of humanitarian emergencies.

Donors have cut off development aid to Afghanistan since the Taliban seized power last year. The new Taliban leadership also faces strict financial sanctions, which have crippled Afghanistan’s banking sector.

“Almost a year has passed, and still the international community hasn’t got any closer to finding a solution to this financial standoff. Until they take steps to resume development aid and revive the economy, they are complicit in the loss of every child who dies from hunger and disease,” said Myers.

Foreign aid made up over half of Afghanistan’s budget, even before the Taliban took power.

International donors have repeatedly urged the Taliban to open secondary schools for girls, allow women to work, and form an inclusive government, but Taliban leaders have remained defiant insisting they have formed a purely Islamic system.

Are the Taliban Losing Their Digital Clout?

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Akmal Dawi
VOA News
July 28, 2022

Taliban chief spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid has more than 630,000 followers of his official Twitter account. But the only web address under his profile links to a terminated page.

Mujahid and his team were once dubbed masters of online propaganda when the Taliban were fighting U.S. forces in Afghanistan. Now, as a de facto government, the Taliban’s use of digital platforms is confronted with service denials, adversarial campaigns and removal from social media platforms.

Last week Meta, Facebook’s parent company, closed the Facebook and Instagram accounts of state-run Radio Television Afghanistan (RTA) and the Bakhtar News Agency.

The accounts were created by the previous U.S.-backed Afghan government and were left for the Taliban, who used them to disseminate news of their government.

“The Taliban is sanctioned as a terrorist organization under U.S. law, and they are banned from using our services under our Dangerous Organizations policies,” a Meta spokesperson told VOA. “This means we remove accounts maintained by or on behalf of the Taliban and prohibit praise, support and representation of them.”

Google follows the same policy.

While VOA was seeking comments for this story, a link to a Taliban YouTube radio channel was sent to Google as a reference. In less than 24 hours, the channel was gone.

“Google is committed to compliance with applicable U.S. sanctions laws and enforces related policies under its Terms of Service. As such, if we find an account that belongs to the Taliban, we terminate it,” a Google spokesperson told VOA.

Twitter

Days after former Afghan President Mohammad Ashraf Ghani fled Afghanistan, Taliban acting Prime Minister Mullah Hasan Akhund occupied the presidential palace popularly known as the Arg (“fort” in the Dari language).

Despite taking control of the physical building in Kabul and all corners of the landlocked country, Akhund has been denied access to the Arg’s previously robust cyber realm. The domain “president.gov.af” is broken. The Arg’s Facebook page, which carried millions of likes, is nonexistent. And the official Twitter handle, @ARG_AFG, has been inactive since August 15, 2021 — the day Ghani fled.

There is no verified Taliban account on Twitter, but the platform has allowed numerous unverified accounts, including Mujahid’s, to promote Taliban policies and statements. Twitter did not respond to requests for comment.

The Taliban started using Twitter in 2011 primarily to target Western audiences and quickly used the service to disseminate propaganda, according to research in 2014 by the Terrorism Research Initiative.

After Meta closed RTA’s Facebook accounts, some campaigners launched the “BanTaliban” hashtag on Twitter. In response, pro-Taliban campaigners launched the “SupportTaliban” hashtag, which according to an AI tracking account generated considerable responses among some Twitter users.

De facto government

The U.S. government has designated several Taliban officials and entities linked to them as Specially Designated Global Terrorists.

As insurgents, the Taliban called for armed attacks against U.S. and allied forces in Afghanistan. But since taking over the government, the group’s rhetoric and statements have shifted more toward governance and social service provision, according to Tamar Mitts, a faculty member at the Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies at Columbia University in New York.

“What makes the Taliban unique is that unlike many other groups, it also functions as a state, which raises questions about whether companies should allow governance-related content on their platforms when the entity that generates the content is designated as a dangerous organization,” Mitts told VOA.

The Taliban have challenged their removal from popular social networking sites as a sign of Western hypocrisy toward free speech.

“The slogan ‘freedom of expression’ is used to deceive other nations,” Mujahid tweeted on July 20.

Unlike in neighboring Iran where the Islamic government has banned Facebook, thus far, the Taliban have not banned social platforms inside Afghanistan.

Under strict international financial sanctions and not recognized as a government by any country, the Taliban are widely condemned for their suppressive policies toward media and women.

Last month, they arrested a famous Afghan YouTuber for alleged insult toward Islamic scriptures.

Some experts believe the Taliban’s propaganda should also be banned on social platforms when they stifle critics and impose censorship on Afghan media.

Mohammad Raziq, Tribal Elder in Parwan, Arrested by Taliban

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8am: Mohammad Raziq, one of the tribal elders of Salang district in Parwan province, is arrested by the Taliban group. In an interview with Hasht-e Subh, sources said that he was arrested this week from the Tajikan area of Jabal Saraj district for collaborating with the National Resistance Front (NRF). Prior to this, dozens of civilians in Parwan, Kapisa and Panjshir provinces have been arrested, tortured and killed by the Taliban on charges of collaborating with NRF. Click here to read more (external link).

Related

SIGAR finds Pentagon failed to control disbursement of Afghan defense force salary funds

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Ariana: The Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) issued a report this week in which it stated the Pentagon made $232 million in questionable salary payments to the former government of Afghanistan’s defense ministry personnel for fiscal year 2019 to May 2020. SIGAR found that during this period, the US Defense Department (DoD) disbursed $232 million to the former Afghan government “for suspicious units and non-existent object codes, or [for salaries] that were never delivered to the bank accounts of MOD personnel.” Click here to read more (external link).

Residents in Samangan: Taliban Checks Private Contents of Our Cell Phones

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8am: Following the increase of house-to-house search operations in Samangan province, the residents of the province say that the Taliban rebels are checking people’s cell phones too. According to residents, the Taliban do not care about people’s privacy and search their homes and mobile phones without a court order. “We have private contents in our mobiles and Taliban do not care and respect this value,” residents added. Click here to read more (external link).

Afghanistan: In a quiet valley the Taliban face armed resistance

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BBC News: Small groups of guerrillas, hidden away on mountain tops, led by soldiers from the former Afghan army, have been launching ambushes and engaging in clashes with the Taliban. In Panjshir, however, anti-Taliban fighters managed to shoot down a military helicopter and capture those on board. Elsewhere in Baghlan Province, resistance fighters have recently filmed themselves pulling down a Taliban flag from a military post. When the BBC travelled to the Andarab valley in June, however, the Taliban appeared in firm control of the territory. Over the past two decades, intrusive raids and allegations of the killing of innocent civilians by Afghan and international forces helped fuel the Taliban’s popularity in parts of the country where they already had a presence and a degree of support. Now, they are accused of using those same counter-insurgency tactics, whilst there appears to be little sense of accountability. Click here to read more (external link).