FP: Wood smuggling is big business for the terrorist group. Small numbers of fighters for the Islamic State of Khorasan Province, the Afghan branch of the militant group, have been in Kunar since 2015. But the group’s new stronghold is in Kunar’s deep forests, inheriting a booming wood industry previously controlled by the Taliban that is now
Mohammad Habibzada VOA News February 18, 2018 Islamic State is chopping down fruit trees and smuggling the timber into Pakistan, claim Afghan officials and local residents of the Deh Bala district of eastern Nangarhar province where the terrorist group operates. “Some of the local residents who previously helped the Taliban [are] now helping IS militants,
VOA News Zia-U-Rahman Hasrat February 8, 2016 JALALABAD—Islamic State has started cutting down trees in some parts of eastern Afghanistan in a timber-smuggling operation to neighboring Pakistan, according to Afghan officials and tribal leaders. Locals in the Afghan province say the terror group has imported tree-cutting machines and has been cutting trees in the Achin,