Atlantic Council: The COVID-19 pandemic is transforming international relations not just by straining relations among powerful states, but also by disrupting violent nonstate actors. Perhaps no major militant outfit has felt the impact as much as the Taliban. The group’s leader, Hibatullah Akhundzada, is either seriously ill with the virus or possibly dead. Sirajuddin Haqqani,
RFE/RL’s Radio Free Afghanistan June 2, 2020 Taliban officials have denied a report that its leader, Mullah Haibatullah Akhundzada, died after contracting the coronavirus. Foreign Policy magazine, citing unnamed Taliban officials, reported on June 1 that Mullah Akhundzada contracted COVID-19 and possibly died while receiving treatment abroad. Foreign Policy quoted Mawlawi Mohammad Ali Jan Ahmad, a senior
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty May 21, 2020 U.S. special peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad has urged a reduction in violence “by all sides” in Afghanistan, saying innocent Afghans are bearing too much of the brunt of the war. Khalilzad, the architect of a February agreement with the Taliban clearing the way for a U.S. troop withdrawal,
RFE/RL’s Radio Free Afghanistan May 20, 2020 KABUL — U.S. special peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad is in Kabul to press the Taliban and Afghan government to start delayed talks amid an uptick in violence — including two more deadly attacks overnight — that threatens to unravel a landmark peace deal between Washington and the militants
Ayaz Gul VOA News March 7, 2020 ISLAMABAD – The Taliban says its peace pact with the United States does not alter the status of the insurgent group’s supreme leader as the “lawful ruler” of Afghanistan, saying he is duty-bound by religion to establish an “Islamic government” after foreign “occupation” troops exit the country. The
Ayaz Gul VOA News February 29, 2020 ISLAMABAD – The United States and the Taliban signed a landmark agreement Saturday in Doha, Qatar, setting the stage for ending a nearly 19-year-old war in Afghanistan and bringing back home thousands of American troops deployed there. U.S. chief negotiator Zalmay Khalilzad and Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the
Ayaz Gul VOA News January 16, 2020 ISLAMABAD – Pakistan announced Thursday the Taliban is ready to reduce violence in Afghanistan, calling it a major breakthrough toward reaching a long-awaited peace deal the insurgent group has been negotiating with the United States. Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi revealed in a video message that Islamabad has
Associated Press: The Taliban promised Washington during months of negotiations that the United States would never again be attacked from Afghan soil. Such a pledge would have included al-Qaida, which planned the 9/11 attacks from inside Afghanistan. Yet jihad, or holy war, and a shared history continue to bind the two militant groups, and there’s no
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty August 17, 2019 Afghanistan’s Taliban says the killing of the brother of their leader in an August 16 bomb attack in Pakistan will not derail peace talks with the United States. Taliban leader Haibatullah Akhundzada was not in the mosque when the bomb went off but his younger brother, Hafiz Ahmadullah,
By RFE/RL’s Radio Mashaal August 16, 2019 The brother of the leader of the Afghan Taliban is reported to have been among those killed in a bomb blast at a mosque in southwest Pakistan. Police said four people were killed and more than 20 injured on August 16 in the explosion at the mosque some