Afghanistan

[RTH10260]

Taliban ‘forcibly evicting’ Hazaras and opponents in Afghanistan
Human Rights Watch has logged illegal seizures of land and homes then given to Taliban supporters

Emma Graham-Harrison
Sat 23 Oct 2021 05.00 BST

Thousands of people have been forced from their homes and land by Taliban officials in the north and south of Afghanistan, in what amounted to collective punishment, illegal under international law, Human Rights Watch has warned.

Many of the evictions targeted members of the Shia Hazara community, while others were of people connected to the former Afghan government. Land and homes seized this way have often been redistributed to Taliban supporters, HRW said.

Forced evictions logged by Human Rights Watch took place across five provinces, including Kandahar, Helmand and Uruzgan in the south, Daikundi in the centre, and the northern province of Balkh.

Many of the people were ordered to leave homes and farms with just a few days’ notice, and without any opportunity to prove their legal ownership. Some were reportedly told that if they did not comply with orders to leave, they “had no right to complain about the consequences”, the report said.

“The Taliban are forcibly evicting Hazaras and others on the basis of ethnicity or political opinion to reward Taliban supporters,” said Patricia Gossman, associate Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “These evictions, carried out with threats of force and without any legal process, are serious abuses that amount to collective punishment.”

The Taliban promised an inclusive government, but chose an all-male cabinet dominated largely by Sunni clerics from the Pashtun ethnic group, from which the group has historically drawn its core support.



https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/ ... fghanistan

[Dave from down under]

Did not see this coming /s

https://mobile.abc.net.au/news/2021-10- ... /100563630

Afghanistan will soon collapse into chaos unless the international community acts rapidly, Swedish and Pakistani ministers have warned.

Key points:

Many countries and institutions have halted development assistance to Afghanistan
The international community has been reluctant to legitimise the new Taliban rulers
Pakistan says engaging with the Taliban will prevent a "humanitarian catastrophe"

Sweden's Mr Fridh said the Taliban had so far failed to prove they had shed the oppressive policies that marked their previous period in power, from 1996-2001.

Mr Fridh said economic free-fall could create an environment in which terrorist groups would thrive.

Sweden, however, would not channel money through the Taliban and would instead boost its humanitarian contributions through Afghan civil society groups.

[Kendra]

CNN witnesses 9-year-old being sold for marriage to 55-year-old man
The Lead

CNN's Anna Coren reports on the humanitarian crisis engulfing Afghanistan as desperate families say they're being forced to sell their young daughters in order to survive.Source: CNN

Warning, this is rough to watch.

[RTH10260]

Afghan Pilots Who Escaped Taliban Are Flown Out of Tajikistan
More than 140 Afghan Air Force pilots and crew members were evacuated to the United Arab Emirates three months after flying into Tajikistan to escape the Taliban.

By David Zucchino
Nov. 9, 2021

More than 140 Afghan Air Force pilots and crew members detained in Tajikistan since mid-August after fleeing Afghanistan were flown out of the country Tuesday with the help of the American authorities, according to a retired U.S. Air Force officer who leads a volunteer group that has assisted the Afghans.

The flight, bound for the United Arab Emirates, ended a three-month ordeal for the U.S.-trained military personnel, who had flown American-supplied aircraft to Tajikistan to escape the Taliban only to end up in custody.

The Afghans said they were counting on the U.S. government to secure their freedom after they were detained by the Tajik authorities after the Taliban seized power in their home country and they fled, fearing reprisals.

In WhatsApp audio recordings made on smuggled cellphones, the English-speaking pilots described poor conditions, insufficient food rations and limited medical care at the site where they were being held outside the capital, Dushanbe.

Brig. Gen. David Hicks, a retired Air Force officer who is chief executive of Operation Sacred Promise, said a plane carrying the Afghans had departed Dushanbe on Tuesday night, U.S. Eastern time, after a long delay.



https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/09/worl ... liban.html

[RTH10260]

Afghan Economy Nears Collapse as Pressure Builds to Ease U.S. Sanctions
Afghanistan’s economy has crashed since the Taliban seized power, plunging the country into one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.

By Christina Goldbaum
Nov. 27, 2021

MAZAR-I-SHARIF, Afghanistan — Racing down the cratered highways at dawn, Mohammad Rasool knew his 9-year-old daughter was running out of time.

She had been battling pneumonia for two weeks and he had run out of cash to buy her medicine after the bank in his rural town closed. So he used his last few dollars on a taxi to Mazar-i-Sharif, a city in Afghanistan’s north, and joined an unruly mob of men clambering to get inside the last functioning bank for hundreds of miles.

Then at 3 p.m., a teller yelled at the crowd to go home: There was no cash left at the bank.

“I have the money in my account, it’s right there,” said Mr. Rasool, 56. “What will I do now?”

Three months into the Taliban’s rule, Afghanistan’s economy has all but collapsed, plunging the country into one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. Millions of dollars of aid that once propped up the previous government has vanished, billions in state assets are frozen and economic sanctions have isolated the new government from the global banking system.

Now, Afghanistan faces a dire cash shortage that has crippled banks and businesses, sent food and fuel prices soaring, and triggered a devastating hunger crisis. Earlier this month, the World Health Organization warned that around 3.2 million children were likely to suffer from acute malnutrition in Afghanistan by the end of the year — one million of whom at risk of dying as temperatures drop.

No corner of Afghanistan has been left untouched.




https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/27/worl ... tions.html

[Uninformed]

“MI6 boss warns of China 'debt traps and data traps'”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-59474365

“The assessment of the speed at which the Taliban would seize control of Kabul as British and American troops withdrew from Afghanistan was "clearly wrong", Mr Moore admitted.
But he said it was "really overblown to describe it in terms of intelligence failure". "None of us predicted the speed of the fall of Kabul," he said.
"Frankly, if we had recruited every member of the Taliban Shura, you know, the leadership group of the Taliban, [if] we recruited every one of them as a secret agent, we still wouldn't have predicted the fall of Kabul because the Taliban didn't."
However, he added that there is no "soft soaping" that the victory of the Taliban had been a "serious reverse" and he is concerned it will be a "morale boost for extremists around the world, and indeed for those sitting in the capitals in Beijing, Tehran, and Moscow".”

Did the “assessment” include being aware that a large number of the Afghan armed forces were simply inventions for the purpose of fraud, and that those who actually existed were not willing / able to fight? A not surprising amount of flannel from a head of MI6 whose career was as a diplomat.

[RTH10260]

Dozens of Former Afghan Security Forces Dead or Missing Under Taliban, Report Says
More than 100 former members of the military and police have been killed or forcibly disappeared by the Taliban since the group came into power, according to an investigation by Human Rights Watch.

By Sharif Hassan
Nov. 30, 2021

More than 100 former members of the Afghan security forces in four provinces have been killed by the Taliban or disappeared at their hands in the first two and a half months of the militants’ rule, according to a new report by Human Rights Watch.

The deaths are part of a string of assassinations and summary executions, largely considered revenge killings, that have been happening across Afghanistan since the fall of Ashraf Ghani’s government in August.

The attacks underscore the dangers that Taliban critics, activists and members of the former government’s security forces face despite the Taliban announcement when they seized power of a general amnesty for former government workers and military officials.

In a report released on Tuesday, Human Rights Watch detailed the killing or forced disappearance of 47 members of the former government’s security forces who had either surrendered to the Taliban or were detained by them between Aug. 15 and Oct. 31 in four of the countries 34 provinces: Ghazni, Helmand, Kandahar and Kunduz.

The group’s research indicates that the Taliban are responsible for the deaths or disappearances of at least another 53 former security force members in the same provinces.

“The Taliban leadership’s promised amnesty has not stopped local commanders from summarily executing or disappearing former Afghan security force members,” said Patricia Gossman, associate Asia director of the Human Rights Watch. “The burden is on the Taliban to prevent further killings, hold those responsible to account and compensate the victims’ families.”



https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/30/worl ... istan.html

[RTH10260]

Taliban turning Afghanistan into narco-terrorist state
Narcotics kingpins now occupy senior positions in Afghan government
Afghanistan accounts for 85% of the global acreage under opium cultivation, making the Taliban the world’s largest drug cartel. | REUTERS

BY BRAHMA CHELLANEY PROJECT SYNDICATE
Nov 24, 2021

NEW DELHI – The strategic folly of U.S. President Joe Biden’s Afghan policy has been laid bare in recent weeks.

First, the country came back under the control of the Pakistan-reared Taliban. The recent announcement of the interim government’s composition then dashed any remaining (naive) hope that this Taliban regime would be different from the one the United States and its allies ousted in 2001. Beyond the Cabinet, including a who’s who of international terrorism, narcotics kingpins occupy senior positions.

Afghanistan accounts for 85% of the global acreage under opium cultivation, making the Taliban the world’s largest drug cartel. It controls and taxes opioid production, oversees exports, and shields smuggling networks. This is essential to their survival. According to a recent report by the United Nations Security Council monitoring team, the production and trafficking of poppy-based and synthetic drugs remain “the Taliban’s largest single source of income.” So reliant are the Taliban on narcotics trafficking that their leaders have at times fought among themselves over revenue-sharing.

The Taliban are hoping to expand their drug income as much as possible. Since their takeover, prices of opium in Afghanistan have more than tripled. In India — which is situated between the world’s two main opium-producing centers, the Pakistan-Afghanistan-Iran “Golden Crescent” and the Myanmar-Thailand-Laos “Golden Triangle” — seizures of Afghan-origin heroin have increased. As the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime warns, the economic crisis Afghanistan currently faces will only increase the appeal of illicit crop cultivation for local farmers.

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https://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/20 ... terrorism/

[RTH10260]

Taliban Decree an End to Forced Marriages in Afghanistan
The decree, attributed to the group’s religious leader, calls for more rights for women under Islamic law, but does not say whether women will regain easier access to education or jobs.

By The Associated Press
Dec. 3, 2021

The Taliban decreed on Friday that they were banning forced marriage of women in Afghanistan, a move apparently meant to address criteria the international community considers a precondition to recognizing the new government and restoring aid to the war-torn country.

The announcement was attributed to the Taliban’s reclusive chief, Sheikh Haibatullah Akhundzada, a cleric chosen as the group’s supreme leader who is believed to be in the southern city of Kandahar. It comes as poverty is surging in Afghanistan after the Taliban takeover in August amid the withdrawal of U.S. and NATO troops. Since then, foreign governments have halted funds that had been a mainstay of the economy.

“Both (women and men) should be equal,” said the decree, adding that “no one can force women to marry by coercion or pressure.”

It is unclear, though, how the decree would be enforced in practice. And the statement did not mention two issues — women’s access to education and the workplace — that have been of central interest to the countries and organizations that have provided aid to Afghanistan.



https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/03/worl ... riage.html

[RTH10260]

Taliban bans forced marriage of women in Afghanistan
Taliban chief in a decree says women should not be considered ‘property’ and must consent to marriage.

3 Dec 2021

The Taliban has issued a decree barring forced marriage in Afghanistan, saying women should not be considered “property” and must consent to marriage, but questions remain about whether the group that returned to power in mid-August would extend women’s rights around work and education.

The decree was announced on Friday by the reclusive Taliban chief, Hibatullah Akhunzada – who is believed to be in the southern city of Kandahar. “Both (women and men) should be equal,” said the decree, adding that “no one can force women to marry by coercion or pressure”.



https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/12/ ... -for-women

[Dave from down under]

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-12-09/ ... /100687800

Afghanistan's drought, its worst in decades, is now entering its second year, exacerbated by climate change. The dry spell has hit 25 of the country's 34 provinces, and this year's wheat harvest is estimated to be down 20 per cent from the year before.

Along with fighting, the drought has contributed to driving more than 700,000 people from their homes this year, and the onset of winter will only increase the potential for disaster.

"This cumulative drought impact on already debilitated communities can be yet another tipping point to catastrophe," the UN Food and Agricultural Organisation's (FAO) Afghanistan office said in a tweet on Tuesday.

[RTH10260]

this article is a bit aged but subject was mentioned in the local Swiss press these days

They Were Protectors in Afghanistan. Now They Need Help.
Former soldiers from Nepal have long served as private security guards in war-torn Afghanistan. Amid the chaos, they worry that they can’t get home.

By Bhadra Sharma
Published Aug. 23, 2021 Updated Aug. 25, 2021

KATHMANDU, Nepal — The suicide bomber driving a sedan packed with explosives struck in the early hours of the morning, as the minibus crawled through Kabul’s traffic.

A piece of shrapnel pierced Amrit Rokaya Chhetri’s left ear. He was lucky. Nine of his follow security workers, hired by a contractor to protect Canada’s embassy in Afghanistan, were killed immediately as metal tore through the packed bus in 2016. Ultimately, 13 Nepalis were among the dead.

They were less than 700 feet from their dormitory. The Taliban claimed responsibility.

“During the day I play the harmonium to forget, or I hang out with my friends,” said Mr. Chhetri, now 41 years old and living in his home village in Nepal. “If that day haunts me at night, I go to the gym for physical exercise, as my doctors suggested.”

The attack five years ago focused attention on the little-known but crucial role that Nepali security personnel play in protecting officials, diplomats and companies in Afghanistan. Hired by private contractors, many are ethnic Gurkhas who have served in the Nepali, Indian or British military, and they often work under conditions that have drawn protests from labor activists. But Nepal, a landlocked country in the Himalayas, is one of the poorest in Asia, making security jobs abroad look appealing.

Now Nepal is trying to get thousands of its people out of Afghanistan. The task is daunting. Reports from Afghanistan suggest the Taliban are tracking those who worked with Western countries. The exact number of Nepali nationals in the country is unclear, and the country does not have an embassy in Afghanistan and lacks resources for helping people stuck there.



https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/23/worl ... urkha.html

[AndyinPA]

https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/02/1112612

The United Nations has condemned the killing of eight polio vaccination workers in four locations in northern Afghanistan on Thursday, the first such attacks since nationwide immunization campaigns resumed last November.

One member of the vaccination transit team was killed in Taloqan district in Takhar province, while four members of house-to-house teams were murdered in two separate incidents in Kunduz city, according to a statement from the UN Country Team.

Two vaccinators and a social mobilizer were killed in Emamsaheb district of Kunduz province.

In the wake of the carnage, the UN immediately suspended the national polio vaccination campaign in Kunduz and Takhar provinces.

[northland10]

https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/02/1112612

The United Nations has condemned the killing of eight polio vaccination workers in four locations in northern Afghanistan on Thursday, the first such attacks since nationwide immunization campaigns resumed last November.

One member of the vaccination transit team was killed in Taloqan district in Takhar province, while four members of house-to-house teams were murdered in two separate incidents in Kunduz city, according to a statement from the UN Country Team.

Two vaccinators and a social mobilizer were killed in Emamsaheb district of Kunduz province.

In the wake of the carnage, the UN immediately suspended the national polio vaccination campaign in Kunduz and Takhar provinces.

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On a slightly related note, apparently, a type 1 Wild Polio Virus case has been confirmed in Malawi. F***. I'll blame Trump since he blames Biden and Hillery for his father refusing to love him.

[RTH10260]

[AndyinPA]

Saw that last night. That was AWESOME.

[RTH10260]

Taliban ban Afghan women from university education
Higher education ministry issues indefinite order three months after thousands sat entrance exams

Staff and agencies in Kabul
Tue 20 Dec 2022 17.49 GMT

Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers have ordered an indefinite ban on university education for the country’s women, the ministry of higher education said in a letter issued to all government and private universities.

“You all are informed to implement the mentioned order of suspending education of females until further notice,” said the letter signed by the minister for higher education, Neda Mohammad Nadeem.

The ministry’s spokesperson, Ziaullah Hashimi, who tweeted the letter, confirmed the order in a text message to Agence France-Presse.

The ban on higher education comes less than three months after thousands of girls and women sat university entrance exams across the country, with many aspiring to choose engineering and medicine as future careers.

After the takeover of Afghanistan by the hardline Islamists in August last year, universities were forced to implement new rules including gender-segregated classrooms and entrances, and women were only permitted to be taught by female professors or old men.

Most Afghan teenage girls have already been banned from secondary school education, severely limiting university intake.




https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/ ... -education

[Dave from down under]

Former Afghan female MP Mursal Nabizada shot dead in Kabul home

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-01-16/ ... /101857590

A former Afghan female MP and her bodyguard have been shot dead at her home in Kabul.

Key points:
Mursal Nabizada, who stayed in Kabul after it fell to the Taliban, was shot in her home

Her brother and a second security guard were injured in the attack, and a third security guard fled the scene with money and jewellery

Police say investigations are underway

Mursal Nabizada was among the few female parliamentarians who stayed in the capital after the Taliban seized power in August 2021.

The killing, carried out by unknown assailants, is the first murder of an MP from the previous administration in the city since the takeover.

Local police chief Molvi Hamidullah Khalid said Ms Nabizada and her guard were shot dead at about 3am on Saturday (local time) in the same room.

He said her brother and a second security guard were injured. A third security guard fled the scene with money and jewellery.

-------------
Might not have been politcal...

[Dave from down under]

However... there are many factions within the Taliban and then there are ISIS-K etc
plus tribalism, crime, etc

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-01-13/ ... /101838000

[RTH10260]

Taliban ban restaurant gardens for families, women in Herat

Mon, April 10, 2023 at 1:43 PM GMT+2

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — The Taliban have banned families and women from restaurants with gardens or green spaces in Afghanistan's northwestern Herat province, an official said Monday. The moves followed complaints from religious scholars and members of the public about mixing of genders in such places, he said.

It was the latest in a slew of restrictions imposed by the Taliban since they took power in August 2021. They have shut girls out of classrooms beyond sixth grade and women from universities, most types of employment, including jobs at the United Nations. They are also banned from public spaces such as parks and gyms.

Authorities say the curbs are in place because of gender mixing or because women allegedly are not wearing the hijab, or Islamic headscarf, correctly.

The outdoor dining ban only applies to establishments in Herat, where such premises remain open to men. Baz Mohammad Nazir, a deputy official from the Ministry of Vice and Virtue's directorate in Herat, denied media reports that all restaurants were off limits to families and women, dismissing them as propaganda.

It applied only to restaurants with green areas, such as a park, where men and women could meet, he said. “After repeated complaints from scholars and ordinary people, we set limits and closed these restaurants.”

Azizurrahman Al Muhajir, who is head of the Vice and Virtue directorate in Herat, said: “It was like a park but they named it a restaurant and men and women were together. Thank God it has been corrected now. Also, our auditors are observing all the parks where men and women go.”



https://www.yahoo.com/news/taliban-ban- ... 13569.html

[Suranis]

Taliban.png (261.87 KiB) Viewed 2148 times

Um....

[RTH10260]

But do the still have cultural heritage sites to show off after the Buddha statues demolition

[RTH10260]

Thank you Donald!

Taliban edict to resume stoning women to death met with horror
Afghan regime’s return to public stoning and flogging is because there is ‘no one to hold them accountable’ for abuses, say activists

Ruchi Kumar and Rukhshana reporters
Thu 28 Mar 2024 19.02 CET

The Taliban’s announcement that it is resuming publicly stoning women to death has been enabled by the international community’s silence, human rights groups have said.

Safia Arefi, a lawyer and head of the Afghan human rights organisation Women’s Window of Hope, said the announcement had condemned Afghan women to return to the darkest days of Taliban rule in the 1990s.

“With this announcement by the Taliban leader, a new chapter of private punishments has begun and Afghan women are experiencing the depths of loneliness,” Arefi said.

“Now, no one is standing beside them to save them from Taliban punishments. The international community has chosen to remain silent in the face of these violations of women’s rights.”

The Taliban’s supreme leader, Hibatullah Akhundzada, announced at the weekend that the group would begin enforcing its interpretation of sharia law in Afghanistan, including reintroducing the public flogging and stoning of women for adultery.

In an audio broadcast on the Taliban-controlled Radio Television Afghanistan last Saturday, Akhundzada said: “We will flog the women … we will stone them to death in public [for adultery].

“You may call it a violation of women’s rights when we publicly stone or flog them for committing adultery because they conflict with your democratic principles,” he said, adding: “[But] I represent Allah, and you represent Satan.”

He justified the move as a continuation of the Taliban’s struggle against western influences. “The Taliban’s work did not end with the takeover of Kabul, it has only just begun,” he said.




https://www.theguardian.com/global-deve ... ith-horror

[RTH10260]

Shutting Afghan women out of key UN conference to appease Taliban ‘a betrayal’
Group allegedly demanding Afghan participation in Doha meeting this month be limited to men and that women’s rights be excluded from the agenda

Tom Levitt , Annie Kelly and Zahra Joya
Fri 21 Jun 2024 17.27 CEST

Excluding Afghan women from an upcoming UN conference on Afghanistan would be a “betrayal” of women and girls in the country, say human rights groups and former politicians.

The Taliban are reportedly demanding that no Afghan women be allowed to participate in the UN meeting in Doha starting 30 June, set up to discuss the international community’s approach to Afghanistan, and that women’s rights are not on the agenda.

Since taking power in Afghanistan in August 2021, the Taliban have restricted women’s access to education, employment and public spaces. In March, it was reported that they would reintroduce the public flogging and stoning of women for adultery.

Sima Samar, former Afghan minister of women’s affairs. Photograph: Britta Pedersen/DPA Picture Alliance/Alamy
The Taliban did not participate in UN talks earlier this year, with the UN chief António Guterres saying at the time that the group presented a set of conditions for its participation that “denied us the right to talk to other representatives of the Afghan society” and were “not acceptable”.

Tirana Hassan, executive director at Human Rights Watch, said: “Excluding women risks legitimising the Taliban’s abuses and triggering irreparable harm to the UN’s credibility as an advocate for women’s rights and women’s meaningful participation.”

In trying to bring the Taliban to the negotiating table now, the UN was giving in to their demands to exclude women’s rights, said the former Afghan minister of women’s affairs Sima Samar.



https://www.theguardian.com/global-deve ... a-betrayal

[RTH10260]

Video appears to show gang-rape of Afghan woman in a Taliban jail
Exclusive: Activist claims she was threatened with release of the footage in order to silence her, amid multiple reports of sexual violence inflicted upon imprisoned Afghan women

Zahra Joya, Chris McGreal, Khudadad Poladi, Annie Kellyand Tom Levitt
Wed 3 Jul 2024 11.36 CEST

The Guardian has seen video evidence of a female Afghan human rights activist being gang-raped and tortured in a Taliban jail by armed men.

There have been mounting reports that sexual violence is being inflicted on women and girls being held in detention in Afghanistan, but this video is believed to be the first direct evidence of these crimes occurring.

According to the activist, the mobile phone footage was later sent to her as a threat that it would be shared more widely if she continued to speak out against the Taliban regime.

In the video recording viewed by the Guardian, the young woman is filmed being told to take off her clothes and is then raped multiple times by two men.

The woman in the video – recorded on a phone by one of the armed men – tries to cover her face with her hands. One of the men pushes her hard when she hesitates as he gives her orders.

At one point she is told, “You’ve been fucked by Americans all these years and now it’s our turn.”

The woman has said that she was arrested for taking part in a public protest against the Taliban and was raped while being held in detention in a Taliban prison. She has since fled Afghanistan. She said that after she spoke out against the Taliban in exile, she was sent the video and told that if she continued to criticise the regime the video would be sent to her family and released on social media.

“If you continue saying anything bad against the Islamic Emirate, we will publish your video,” she said she was told.

She believes that the attack was deliberately recorded to be used to silence and shame her. The person filming the assault captures her standing naked with her face visible and she is identifiable during the attacks.


https://www.theguardian.com/global-deve ... liban-jail