Taliban fighters (file photo)
8am: Local sources in Panjshir province say a 45-year-old man has died as a result of being tortured by Taliban fighters. According to sources, the man was arrested by the Taliban on Tuesday and his body, which shows signs of torture, was taken to Rokha Hospital today. Sources state that the man’s name was Munir and he was engaged in animal husbandry in the Bazarak district. Click here to read more (external link).
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Ariana: As firefighters battle a wildfire in Afghanistan’s eastern Nuristan province officials said Thursday that the blaze has been brought under control by about 90 percent. The fire, which has raged for 11 days, has destroyed about 200 acres of forest. The cause of the fire has not been ascertained but locals say a clash between residents resulted in fires. Click here to read more (external link).
8am: With the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, Pakistan has become Afghanistan’s most important natural resources market. Local sources in Takhar province say that hundreds of trucks carrying coal are being loaded and transported to Pakistan on daily basis from his province. According to sources, some Taliban officials and commanders are involved in the deal. Residents of Taloqan, the capital of Takhar province say that if the province continues to extract and export coal to Pakistan in its current volume, people will face shortage of fuel (especially coal) in the coming winter. Click here to read more (external link).
8am: Sources in Badakhshan province have reported that the Taliban group has been deploying additional forces to Badakhshan and other northern provinces where NRF forces have an active presence. In addition, it is further reported that localities in Badakhshan province are being forced to join the Taliban group and fight against NRF. The group is forcibly mobilizing the youths and localities in Badakhshan to send them to Panjshir for using them as human shield walls on battlegrounds, the sources added. It is also reported that the Taliban fighters severely torture and beat up those youths and teenagers who oppose taking part in the Panjshir clashes. Click here to read more (external link).
Nature.com: The academic week has been split so that male and female students can be taught separately, for three days each. Academics say this segregation, and the shortage of female lecturers, has reduced the quality of education, particularly for women. Some subjects have even been discontinued for female students, according to some scholars and students. Women and people belonging to minority ethnic groups, such as Hazara and Tajik people, say they have been persecuted. Click here to read more (external link).
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Tolo News: Baghlan’s Department of Agriculture and Irrigation recently issued 20,000 collection bills to the province’s farmers in order to collect tithes and zakat. According to department officials, farmers are obligated to pay fifty percent of their tithes and zakat to this department based on the distributed documents. However, in reaction to the Department of Agriculture’s decision, farmers in Baghlan province said that the drought in recent years have caused them enormous losses, making it difficult for them to pay significant tithes and zakat. “We are the farmers who work hard. It is too difficult for us (the poor people) to pay 50 percent of our yield to the Islamic Emirate [Taliban], it is very difficult for poor people,” said Zekrullah, a farmer. Click here to read more (external link).
8am: In a letter, the Taliban’s Education Department in Ghazni province has ordered all girls’ schools from fourth grade to sixth to wear full hijab and cover their faces while commuting to school. Sources from some girls’ schools in Ghazni have confirmed that it is added in the letter that students who do not follow this order will be expelled from school. Meanwhile, it has been more than nine months that the Taliban group has closed all the education doors to girls above sixth grade. Click here to read more (external link).
The Washington Post: The West’s fixation on the war in Ukraine stands in contrast with its tacit disregard for the situation in Afghanistan. The world watched with horror as the Taliban swept to power in Kabul at the end of last summer, marking a brutal coda to two decades and trillions of dollars worth of American-led state-building and counterinsurgency. In Washington and various European capitals, there was fury at the Biden administration for its chaotic withdrawal and lamentations for the plight of Afghan women and girls, once more in the draconian grip of a fundamentalist militia bent on curtailing their freedoms. Click here to read more (external link).
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8am: In a new move, the Taliban group has removed Persian and Baluchi languages from the courtroom signboard in Nimruz province. Nimruz residents have criticized this move of the Taliban, saying that the province has never been a place of ethnic disputes, but the Taliban are trying to create ethnic and linguistic divisions in the region. The group had previously removed the Dari language from the signboard of Balkh University which had provoked very serious reactions from the people, urging the Taliban to stop fueling ethnic tensions and creating more crises through the illogical ethnic oriented moves. Click here to read more (external link).