Page 14 - Taliban

Pak-Afghan rift widens after Taliban minister trashes Durand line as border

New Delhi, June 19: The Taliban administration's Defence Minister Maulvi Muhammad Yaqub Mujahid has said that the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan, called the Durand Line, is merely a 'line'

Hundreds of Afghans languish in Albania in a prolonged US visa process

Almost two years since he fled Afghanistan to escape the Taliban takeover, Firooz Mashoof is still haunted by the memory of his last day in Kabul the bus that took him to the airport, getting on a packed plane and taking off as gunfire echoed across the city. The last thing I saw were the mountains around Kabul and the dreary sunset as the Qatar Airways took off, he said. Today, thousands of miles from his homeland, the 35-year-old photojournalist and former employee of the Afghan soccer federation, is languishing in warm and sunny Albania. With each passing day, his anxiety grows over the delay in the promised US visa, casting a shadow on his dreams of a new beginning in America. For hundreds of others like him, it's an emotional roller coaster. Some try to find work and live with a semblance of normalcy but the concern and fear for families back home permeates their days even in welcoming Albania. They are hopeful, despite the prolonged bureaucracy, and look to a new life. In

Taliban seeks further aid from UN for Afghan people in different fields

Hanif while describing the humanitarian aid as vital but not enough, said that the United Nations should launch development projects in Afghanistan

UN in talks with Taliban over handover of education programmes, classes

As per UNICEF, it had received assurances from the Taliban's Education Ministry that its community-based classes, which educate 500,000 students, would continue while they discussed the matter

Taliban back to exclusionary, Pashtun-centred policies of late 90s: Report

An annual report by the United Nations Analytical Support and Sanctions Monitoring Team for the UNSC Committee has criticized what it considers the return of Taliban to exclusionary policies

Taliban slam 'baseless and biased' UN report suggesting rifts within ranks

The Taliban condemned on Sunday a baseless and biased report from the UN Security Council highlighting rifts within the group's ranks. The last seven months have seen a greater shift of power from the capital Kabul to the southern city of Kandahar, a Taliban heartland and the base of the group's supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada. A report issued earlier in June by the UN Security Council's Analytical Support and Sanctions Monitoring Team said that the Taliban governance structures remain highly exclusionary, Pashtun-centred and repressive toward all forms of opposition. It also said Kandahar's return as the seat of power like it was during the Taliban's rule of Afghanistan in the 1990s circumvents senior Taliban ministers in Kabul, the centre of the current government, because of the way decisions are made. Key figures, such as the Taliban's main spokesman, have set up offices in the south of Kandahar. Monumental decrees such as those excluding women and girls from education

Threat of terrorism from Taliban rising in Afghanistan, region: UN report

The link between the Taliban and Al-Qaeda and Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan remains strong and symbiotic, according to a UN report which said the ability of terrorist groups to freely manoeuvre under the Taliban de facto authorities in Afghanistan is raising the threat of terrorism in the country and the region. The fourteenth report of the Analytical Support and Sanctions Monitoring Team of the 1988 Taliban Sanctions Committee of the UN Security Council said that contrary to statements to not allow Afghan soil to be used for attacks against other countries, the Taliban have harboured and allowed active support of Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan. While maintaining links to numerous terrorist entities, the Taliban have lobbied member states for counter-terrorism assistance in its fight against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant Khorasan Province (ISIL-K), which it perceives as its principal rival. The link between the Taliban and both Al-Qaeda and Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) remains

UNICEF concerned by Taliban move to bar int'l NGOs from education sector

UNICEF said on Thursday it is deeply concerned by reports of the Taliban pushing out international organizations from Afghanistan's education sector and ordering them to hand over their activities to local nongovernmental groups. It's the latest restriction on NGOs operating in the country after the ban imposed in December on Afghan female staff, allegedly because they weren't wearing the Islamic headscarf, or hijab, correctly and weren't complying with gender segregation in the workplace. In April, the ban was extended to the UN. A WhatsApp voice note, purportedly from a senior education official in Kabul, says all international organisations have a one-month deadline to transfer their education work to local groups. The Education Ministry was not immediately available to verify the voice note, but aid agency officials told The Associated Press they are aware of the message and are taking it seriously. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorised to speak t

No infiltration of Taliban into Kashmir post-Kabul fall: GOC Chinar Corps

The apprehensions about the influx of Taliban fighters into Kashmir after the fall of Kabul in 2021 did not materialise and no Afghani Taliban has infiltrated into the valley, a senior Army officer has said here. General Officer Commanding (GOC) of Chinar Corps Lieutenant General A D S Aujla also said that due to the ongoing internal crisis in Pakistan, there are no major worries regarding Kashmir but the armed forces have to remain alert to thwart any attempts to push in infiltrators, narcotics or weapons. "As far as the apprehensions which were there post Taliban 2.0 are concerned, we could see the manifestations (of concern) on this side as well in Kashmir but it never happened," Lt Gen Aujla told PTI in an interview on Wednesday. A certain amount of chatter and a certain amount of signature was being reported on the other side in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK), but it never translated into reality onto this side, he said. "So, there was no infiltration of any Afghani Taliban..

Here's how a covert relationship with Taliban backfired for US ally Pak

"Pakistan saw the Taliban as deeply connected to the TTP and able to persuade it to stop its attacks"

Afghanistan's acting FM Amir Khan Muttaqi terms world's sanctions 'cruel'

Muttaqi said, "The world countries should listen, they should not pursue their cases under the pretext that these people are being harmed here"

Taliban appoints new Afghan ambassador, MEA says no formal notice received

There are also concerns about how India would react if a Taliban-approved dispensation at the Afghan Embassy in Delhi were to act against Afghans in India

Afghanistan facing catastrophic food crisis, says World Bank report

Afghanistan is among one of the seven countries which face a catastrophic level of food crisis, the World Bank highlighted in its report, Khaama Press reported

Taliban asks Pakistan to observe tolerance in Ex- PM Imran Khan case

Taliban government has expressed its dismay at civil war-like situation in Pakistan. The two Islamic nations share a 2,640-km long boundary

China pulls off its Afghan investment gambit after a delayed start

China is ready to help Afghanistan realise self-reliance, peace, stability, development and prosperity at an early date, said Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Qin Gang

UN report urges Afghanistan's Taliban to end floggings, executions

A UN report on Monday strongly criticized the Taliban for carrying out public executions, lashings and stonings since seizing power in Afghanistan, and called on the country's rulers to halt such practices. In the past six months alone, 274 men, 58 women and two boys were publicly flogged in Afghanistan, according to a report by the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, or UNAMA. Corporal punishment is a violation of the Convention against Torture and must cease, said Fiona Frazer, the agency's human rights chief. She also called for an immediate moratorium on executions. The Taliban foreign ministry said in response that Afghanistan's laws are determined in accordance with Islamic rules and guidelines, and that an overwhelming majority of Afghans follow those rules. In the event of a conflict between international human rights law and Islamic law, the government is obliged to follow the Islamic law, the ministry said in a statement. The Taliban began carrying out such

China's Belt and Road initiative to enter Afghanistan in Taliban victory

Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang and his Pakistani counterpart Bilawal Bhutto Zardari met in Islamabad on Saturday and pledged to work together on Afghanistan's reconstruction process

UN assistance mission repeats commitment to stay in Afghanistan amid crisis

As the humanitarian crisis continues to persist in war-torn Afghanistan under Taliban rule, the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) has reaffirmed its commitment to stay TOLOnews reported

Expects Taliban to fulfil promise of inclusive government: Russian Minister

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said they expect "Taliban leaders" to fulfil their promises of forming an inclusive government

UN experts warn Taliban restrictions on women may amount to femicide

Taliban restrictions on Afghan women and girls may amount to femicide if they are not reversed, a team of U.N. experts warned on Friday. Since they seized power in Afghanistan in August 2021, the Taliban have barred women from most jobs and workplaces, and girls can't go to school beyond the sixth grade. Woman are also banned from public spaces and must cover themselves from head to toe outside the home. In a statement released Friday, the U.N. experts accused Afghanistan's Taliban authorities of the "most extreme forms of misogyny" and said there could be multiple preventable deaths that may amount to femicide if the restrictions are not reversed. The restrictive measures and bans imposed by the Taliban have caused international condemnation and outrage, but the Taliban have shown no sign of willingness to lift them. The U.N. experts also said the Taliban are imposing their interpretation of Islam, which appear not to be shared by the vast majority of Afghans. They expressed alarm