Tolo News: On Monday, the Ministry of Public Health reported 1,485 new positive cases of COVID-19 out of 4,238 samples tested in the last 24 hours. The ministry also reported 77 deaths from COVID-19 and 834 recoveries in the same period. The number of total recorded cases is 127,464 and total deaths is 5,360, according to figures by the Public Health Ministry. Click here to read more (external link).
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Tolo News: Keemia Yosefi and Shah Mamoud Noorzaye, the two Afghan athletes who will compete in the Tokyo Olympics, left Kabul on Sunday for Japan, Afghanistan’s National Olympic Committee announced. The Olympics are scheduled to start on July 23. Both Afghan athletes will represent Afghanistan in the 100 meter race in the athletics category and they will be in quarantine until the games kick-off. Click here to read more (external link).
Tolo News: Dozens of women took up arms – some of them heavy weapons – and marched in the capital city of Feroz Koh to pledge their support the Republic and the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces. The women said that the historical record of the five years of the Taliban regime proved that the group violates women’s rights. Click here to read more (external link).
Scott Miller
Ken Bredemeier
VOA News
July 4, 2021
WASHINGTON – As the last U.S. forces are withdrawn from Afghanistan after nearly 20 years of fighting, the American commander says he is worried about the territorial advance of Taliban insurgents attempting to take back control of the country.
U.S. Army Gen. Scott Miller, in an interview broadcast Sunday on ABC’s “This Week” show, said the Taliban is “gaining strength.”
“We should be concerned,” he said. “The loss of terrain is concerning.”
For the Afghans trying to maintain control, he said, “Hope matters. Morale matters.”
“I don’t like leaving friends in need,” Miller said as he oversaw the last U.S. troops leaving the mammoth Bagram Airfield this past week.
“You look at the security situation and it’s not good.” he said. “The Taliban is on the move.”
The Taliban have captured more 100 districts since early May.
U.S. President Joe Biden ordered the U.S. troop withdrawal, a position also favored by former President Donald Trump before he left office in January.
In April, Biden announced, “It is time to end the forever war” in Afghanistan, saying that the United States had accomplished its stated goal of denying terrorists a haven in the country.
The U.S. invaded Afghanistan in 2001 to combat al-Qaida terrorists who had been training there in advance of their September 11 attacks on New York and the Pentagon outside Washington that killed nearly 3,000 people.
Miller said there were “judgments” that had to be made about the withdrawal. He said there were U.S. victories in the Afghan fighting, even as 2,300 U.S. troops were killed over two decades.
But he also said, “The amount of self-reflection [about the U.S. military performance in Afghanistan] will be important.”
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Los Angeles Times: The capital’s morning rush hour is a discordant backdrop for the workshop of Izzatullah Neamat. But walk down an alley, sidestep a sewage canal, and there he is: ensconced in the rabble among dozens of rubabs — an ancient instrument that resembles a lute — that have become his life’s work and family legacy. Click here to read more (external link).
Daily Beast: KARACHI, PAKISTAN—As the U.S. exits Afghanistan, Beijing is preparing to swoop into the war-torn country and fill the vacuum left by the departed U.S. and NATO troops. China is poised to make an exclusive entry into post-U.S. Afghanistan with its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Speaking on condition of anonymity, a source close to government officials in Afghanistan told The Daily Beast that Kabul authorities are growing more intensively engaged with China on an extension of the $62 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC)—the flagship project of BRI, which involves the construction of highways, railways and energy pipelines between Pakistan and China—to Afghanistan. Click here to read more (external link).
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Tolo News: The Ministry of Public Health on Sunday reported 1,243 new cases of COVID-19 out of 4,642 samples tested in the last 24 hours. Although this is a slight decrease in the number of daily cases, health officials still warned the public against failing to take precautions to contain the spread of the virus. Click here to read more (external link).
Bagram (file photo)
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
July 3, 2021
The Pentagon says the turnover of Bagram Airfield to Afghan security forces was a “key milestone” in the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan, but insisted the U.S. military still has the authority to protect Afghan forces.
The comments from Defense Department spokesman John Kirby on July 2 come amid growing worry about the security situation in Afghanistan, with an uptick in Taliban attacks in some regions.
The head of a Russian-led military alliance that includes several Central Asian nations bordering Afghanistan signaled that Moscow was considering more support for security on the Tajik-Afghan border.
The U.S. military on July 2 vacated Bagram Airfield, a former Soviet base north of Kabul that U.S. forces took over months after the invasion that followed the September 11, 2001, terror attacks.
The withdrawal moves forward the final pullout that the White House now says will be completed by the end of August.
White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki says that the United States will continue to provide security systems and humanitarian assistance in the months ahead.
Kirby told reporters that despite the Bagram withdrawal, the U.S. military still has authority to protect Afghan forces.
“Those authorities still exist,” Kirby told reporters. He did not give a timeline for when they might end.
President Joe Biden said the troops’ departure was on track, but some American forces will still be in Afghanistan in September as part of a “rational drawdown with allies.”
The Bagram withdrawal came more than two months ahead of Biden’s self-imposed deadline of September 11, the 20th anniversary of the Al-Qaeda terrorist attacks on the United States that prompted the U.S.-led invasion.
Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid tweeted that the exit of all U.S. and NATO forces from Bagram was a “positive step,” and called for the “withdrawal of foreign forces from all parts of the country.”
Kirby told reporters that an official end to the pullout will not be announced soon because a number of related issues still need to be worked out, including a new U.S. military command structure in Kabul and talks with Turkey on an arrangement for maintaining security at the Kabul airport.
“A safe, orderly drawdown enables us to maintain an ongoing diplomatic presence, support the Afghan people and the government, and prevent Afghanistan from once again becoming a safe haven for terrorists that threatens our homeland,” Kirby said.
Kirby said that Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has approved a new command structure in Afghanistan to transition the U.S. military mission from warfighting to two new objectives — protecting a continuing U.S. diplomatic presence in Kabul and maintaining liaison with the Afghan military.
Austin’s plan calls for the top commander in Afghanistan, Army General Scott Miller, to transfer his combat authorities to the Florida-based head of U.S. Central Command, Marine General Frank McKenzie, before relinquishing his command this month.
Kirby said Miller will remain in command for “a couple of weeks” to prepare for and complete the turnover of his duties to McKenzie and also will be traveling inside and beyond Afghanistan.
The administration is also narrowing options for ensuring the safety of thousands of Afghans whose applications for special visas to immigrate to the United States have yet to be approved. The administration has already said it’s willing to evacuate the Afghans, who worked as interpreters and fulfilled other roles in support of U.S. military, to third countries pending their visa approvals but has yet to determine where.
Bloomberg reported on July 2 that the U.S. State Department had asked the Central Asian nations of Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and Kazakhstan if they were willing to host Afghans fleeing the country. There was no independent confirmation of that, however.
Russia is watching the security situation in Afghanistan closely, fearing instability in fragile border states like Tajikistan, which already hosts a Russian military base and provides support for border securty.
The chief of the the Collective Security Treaty Organization, an alliance headed by Moscow and encompassing Tajikistan and other Central Asian states, said more needed to be done to help Tajikistan.
“The situation in Afghanistan is worsening. I will not say that it is deteriorating dramatically, no, but, of course, the situation there gives rise to considerable concern,” alliance Secretary General Stanislav Zas was quoted by the TASS news agency as saying on July 3.
“There is clear understanding of the need to provide assistance to Tajikistan precisely in ensuring the security of the Tajik-Afghan border,” he said.
With reporting by AP, Reuters, and Radio Free Afghanistan
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