Baradar
Tolo News: Deputy Prime Minister Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar in an interview with Radio-Television of Afghanistan (RTA) on Monday said that the Islamic Emirate will not include members of the fallen republic government in its cabinet. Baradar accused the former government officials of “being corrupt” emphasizing that even including a few of them will harm the integrity of the Islamic Emirate. Click here to read more (external link).
Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi
Ayaz Gul
VOA News
January 3, 2021
Pakistan said Monday it was engaging with Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers through diplomatic channels to resolve “some confusions” stemming from the installation of a security fence on the porous border separating the two countries.
Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi told a news conference in Islamabad that his country was determined to protect its “interests” and continue unilateral fencing Pakistan’s nearly 2,600-kilometer border with Afghanistan.
The Pakistani chief diplomat was responding to recent attempts by Taliban border forces aimed at preventing Pakistan from building the barrier. The latest such incident apparently happened over the weekend when the Afghan side dismantled a portion of the fence.
“We are not silent. We have installed the fence and, God willing, this effort will continue,” Qureshi stressed. “Afghanistan is our friendly neighbor. We are engaged with them, as some confusions have emerged, and we shall be able to resolve them through diplomatic channels.”
A Taliban Defense Ministry spokesman on Sunday criticized the fencing project, saying Pakistan had “no right to erect barbed wire along the Durand Line and separate the tribes on both sides of the line.”
Successive governments in Afghanistan have disputed the 1893 British colonial-era demarcation. The boundary was the outcome of an agreement between Sir Mortimer Durand, a secretary of the British Indian government, and then-Afghan ruler Abdur Rahman Khan.
Pakistan dismisses Afghan objections, saying it inherited the international border after gaining independence from Britain in 1947. But the differences over the status of the border continue to strain bilateral ties.
The massive military-led construction effort started in 2017 to block illegal militant movement and smuggling. Pakistani officials say more than 90% of the work has been completed.
The fencing project occasionally triggered fatal clashes between Pakistani troops and Afghan security forces of the former Western-backed government in Kabul that the Taliban ousted last August.
WATCH: In a crackdown on sale of alcohol, #Afghan intelligence agents poured 3,000 litres of liquor into a canal pic.twitter.com/CcMxUi5gMP
— Hindustan Times (@htTweets) January 3, 2022
AFP: A team of Afghan intelligence agents poured about 3,000 litres of liquor into a canal in Kabul, the country’s spy agency has said, as the new Taliban authorities crack down on the sale of alcohol. Video footage released by the General Directorate of Intelligence showed its agents pouring alcohol stored in barrels into the canal after seizing it during a raid in the capital. Click here to read more (external link).
8am: The Taliban forces faced a military response from the Turkmen border forces when they went to the border of Khamab district to check the security situation this morning. For the past month, Turkmenistan has been the third neighboring country to be attacked by Taliban forces. Click here to read more (external link).
Ariana: Residents of the village of Balasour in Iran found two children next to their mother’s body on the border between Iran and Turkey, foreign media outlets reported. Several Iranian and Turkish media outlets, including CNN Turk and Iranwire, quoted officials as saying that an Afghan woman who had tried to enter Turkey illegally died of cold but her two children aged eight and nine survived. Click here to read more (external link).
Ariana: Afghanistan National Cricket Team on Monday left Kabul for Qatar to feature in a three-match ODI series against the Netherlands. Afghanistan Cricket Board said in a statement that the three ODIs are scheduled to be held from 21st -25th January. Click here to read more (external link).
8am: The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan’s spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid says a delegation of Russian investors met with the second deputy prime minister Abdul Salam Hanafi, saying that they are interested in investing in oil and gas extraction in Afghanistan. Click here to read more (external link).
VIDEO: #Taliban beheading mannequins of clothing stores while saying "Allah Akbar".
The #Taliban have ordered a series of mannequin beheadings, telling clothes shops to remove the heads of dummies that offend #Islam.
VIDEO👇 pic.twitter.com/90ts6GVYhH
— Natiq Malikzada | ناطق ملکزاده (@natiqmalikzada) January 3, 2022
Ayaz Gul
VOA News
January 3, 2021
ISLAMABAD — Clothing shops in Afghanistan’s western Herat province have begun removing the heads of display mannequins, in line with new directives given by the local office of the Taliban’s ministry for Islamic guidance.
Obeidullah Yari, a local business community leader, told VOA on Monday that about 20% of the shops in the provincial capital, also named Herat, have already implemented the order to escape punishment.
The Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention Vice, which is responsible for administering the Taliban’s interpretation of Islam, decreed last week that shop mannequins should have their heads removed for being offensive to Islam, warning that violators would be punished.
City mall owners and garment sellers initially criticized the Taliban directive, telling Afghan media that mannequins were also used to display clothes in other Islamic counties. But Yari said shopkeepers were now removing the heads of the dummies.
Aziz Rahman, the provincial head of the ministry, told local media he ordered shopkeepers to hack the heads off their mannequins because “they are idols.” He went on to explain that Islam prohibits idolatry, or the worshipping of idols.
Taliban authorities reportedly have also increased monitoring of public taxis in the capital, Kabul, to see if drivers are abiding by the ministry’s instructions related to women’s right to travel.
The decree requires drivers to carry only those female passengers who wear a headscarf or Islamic hijab and are accompanied by a male relative if they travel more than 72 kilometers. It also instructs cabdrivers to grow beards, stop their vehicles at prayer times and stop playing music while driving.
The ministry reportedly has also banned Afghan women from driving. It has also ordered local channels to stop showing dramas and soap operas featuring actresses, and female news anchors to wear hijabs while on the air.
Taliban chief spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid, in a recent interview to Afghan state television, defended the steps taken by the Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention Vice, saying they should not be a matter of concern for anyone because “Afghanistan is Muslim nation and no one is opposed to Islamic laws in the country.”
Mujahid said, however, that all government “religious departments” are instructed not to “mistreat people and be polite to them” while giving them guidance about Islam.
The ultraconservative Taliban regained power in August and named an all-male interim Cabinet to govern the conflict-torn country in line with the group’s strict interpretation of Islam, despite pledging not to revert to the harsh polices of their previous regime from 1996 to 2001.
The government has allowed schoolboys to return to classes but girls across many Afghan provinces are still waiting for permission to do so and most women have been prevented from returning to work.
When the Taliban were last in power, girls were not allowed to attend school and women were barred from work as well as education. The then-Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, or the morals police, had been accused of serious human rights abuses, leading to Afghanistan’s isolation from the world.
Mujahid said that arrangements were being made to allow all Afghan girls to resume their educational activities, noting that schoolgirls across several provinces have already rejoined classes.
Critics, however, are skeptical of the Taliban assurances and say the group is gradually bringing back its repressive policies of the past.
“It was expected; but I would have welcomed every single employee of this ministry to be focused on poverty reduction, aid delivery and lifting the beggars from the street, feeding them & giving them a job as their 1st priority,” tweeted Torek Farhadi, a former Afghan official.
The United States and the global community at large have not recognized the new Taliban government and suspended most non-humanitarian financial assistance to the aid-dependent country.
Foreign countries continue to refuse to open direct political engagement with the Islamist group until it ensures respect for human rights, especially those of women, runs the country inclusively and cuts ties with transnational terrorists.
Meanwhile, Afghanistan is in the grip of a severe humanitarian crisis stemming from years of war, drought and poverty. The United Nations has repeatedly warned that more than half the population in the country are facing starvation, with nearly a million children at risk of dying because of a “severe acute malnutrition.”
Fahim Dashty
8am: The vehicle carrying Dashty and General Wadud with their two bodyguards was stopped by the Taliban on the Dashtak-Tawakh route, and they were buried in a mass grave after being shot on the side of the road. Click here to read more (external link).