Category: Afghanistan

According to the report, a “range of terrorist groups has greater freedom of manoeuvre under the Taliban de facto authorities”…reports Asian Lite News

The link between the Afghan Taliban and proscribed militant outfits Al Qaeda and Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) remains “strong and symbiotic”, as per a report published by the United Nations (UN), media reports said.

The 14th report of the Analytical Support and Sanctions Monitoring Team of the UN Security Council’s 1988 Taliban Sanctions Committee noted that a “range of terrorist groups has greater freedom of manoeuvre under the Taliban de facto authorities”, Dawn reported.

“They are making good use of this, and the threat of terrorism is rising in both Afghanistan and the region,” the report read.

“While they have sought to reduce the profile of these groups and conducted 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 report said that the Taliban forces have conducted operations against ISIL-K, in general, but they have not delivered on the counter-terrorism provisions under the Agreement for Bringing Peace to Afghanistan between the US and the Taliban.

“There are indications that Al Qaeda is rebuilding operational capability, that TTP is launching attacks into Pakistan with support from the Taliban, that groups of foreign terrorist fighters are projecting threat across Afghanistan’s borders and that the operations of ISIL-K are becoming more sophisticated and lethal (if not more numerous),” it added, Dawn reported.

However, the Afghan Taliban dismissed the report and called it “full of prejudice”.

“The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan considers the continuation of UN Security Council sanctions and such reports as full of prejudice and in conflict with the principles of independence and non-interference, and calls for an end to it,” Taliban government spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said in a statement, Dawn reported.

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Kabul’s youth is fed up with poverty and called on the Taliban to provide opportunities in the work and education field….reports Asian Lite News

Kabul youth has said young people must take the path of illegal immigration as unemployment is on the rise in Afghanistan, TOLO News reported.

Young people said it has become more difficult to cover the costs of living in the current situation and therefore they have to go to neighbouring countries or farther away.
Abubaker is a resident of Laghman and head of a 9-member family and decided to go to Iran illegally. “I want to go to Iran for work, I am in the 12 grade but now I will leave school,” said Abubaker.

Kabul’s youth is fed up with poverty and called on the Taliban to provide opportunities in the work and education field.

“There is no work, and we have to go there to another country and travel,” said Emal, a Nangarhar resident, as quoted by TOLO News.

“We ask the government to provide work for youth and to provide an educated generation so that young people are not forced to go abroad,” said Abdul Ali, a Kabul resident.

The Taliban’s Ministry of Economy said that they have large economic projects to reduce poverty in the country, which will provide job opportunities for hundreds of young people.

“To reduce poverty, strengthen small and medium industries, activate half-finished projects and developmental projects, as well as launch macroeconomic projects, these are on our agenda,” said Abdul Latif Nazari, deputy of the Taliban Economic Ministry.

According to reports, every day hundreds of people go on smuggling routes into neighbouring countries. (ANI)

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Reports said several local Taliban officials were among those killed or wounded…reports Asian Lite News

An explosion inside a mosque in north-east Afghanistan has caused multiple casualties, media reports said.

Reports said several local Taliban officials were among those killed or wounded.

A local official said the blast took place during a prayer service for the deputy governor of Badakhshan province, who was killed by a car bomb earlier this week, BBC reported.

The Islamic State militant group said they carried out the car bomb attack.

Muizuddin Ahmadi, the local Taliban head of information, said it was unclear how many people have been killed in the mosque blast in the provincial capital, Faizabad, but there had been multiple casualties.

Mourners were attending the funeral of Maulvi Ahmadi, the Taliban deputy governor of Badakhshan, who was killed on his way to work on Tuesday. One other person was also killed while six were wounded in that attack, BBC reported.

Two sources confirmed to the BBC that two local Taliban officials were killed at the mosque, including the former police commander of northern Baghlan province.

Eyewitnesses said gunfire could be heard after the explosion.

Footage shows several casualties arriving at the hospital in the capital by ambulance, BBC reported.

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Six individuals were injured in the incident, while one other person died…reports Asian Lite News

Mawlawi Nisar Ahmad Ahmadi, Taliban’s acting deputy governor of the Badakhshan province, was killed in a car bombing incident in the provincial capital of Faizabad on Tuesday morning, TOLOnews reported citing an official.

The deputy governor’s convoy at Mahkama plaza of Faizabad was the target of a vehicle bomb, according to Mauzuddin Ahmadi, Thead of Taliban-led Badakhshan’s department of information and culture. Six individuals were injured in the incident, while one other person died, according to Ahmadi.

“A car full of explosives driven by the suicide attacker blew up in front of the vehicle of Mawlawi Ahmad Ahmadi, deputy and acting Minister of Badakhshan, killing the deputy governor and his driver,” he said, according to TOLOnews.

Some nearby residents also sustained injuries in the blast.

“I was sitting here. We heard the blast and my brother came to me, his neck and feet soaked in blood. We took them to the hospital,” said Hizbullah, a resident, TOLOnews reported.

No one has claimed responsibility for the attack as of yet, according to reports.

24 killed in accident

At least 24 passengers were killed after a minibus plunged into ravine in Afghanistan’s Sari Pul province, a police spokesman said on Thursday.

The deadly accident took place on Wednesday evening in Sayad district due to reckless driving and the victims comprised 12 women, eight children and four men, the spokesman said, adding that only a woman survived but was badly injured, reports Xinhua news agency.

This was the second road accident in Afghanistan on Wednesday.

On Wednesday morning, a road accident in the central Bamyan province killed 14 people.

Another similar tragedy occurred on Saturday in Wardak province, leaving two people dead and eight more hurt.

In the Behsod area of Wardak on Friday, a minibus overturned, leaving two people dead and eight others hurt, according to provincial police spokesperson Mohammad Yusuf Asrar.

Asrar claims that irresponsible driving caused the mini-bus to overturn, killing several people, according to Khaama Press.

All victims, including women and children, were sent for medical attention to the closest hospital. Reckless driving, poorly built roads, a lack of the rule of law, and badly maintained cars have all contributed to a surge in traffic accidents across the nation. (ANI)

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Hamid Karzai, the former president of Afghanistan, expressed outrage over the incident and advocated more security on Twitter….reports Asan Lite News

The United Nations, civil rights advocates, and political leaders from all across the globe have put forward their opinions about the alleged poisoning of female students in Sar-e-Pul province of Afghanistan, reported TOLOnews.

Concerned over “an alleged incident…in which approximately 80 girls and women fell ill in two schools in Sanchark District, in the north of Afghanistan,” the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund stated, according to the Afghan news agency. In order to keep girls and women safe, UNICEF said it was relying on the “de facto authorities to investigate this incident thoroughly, to do everything possible to keep girls and women safe, and, if there is foul play, to hold the perpetrators accountable.”

Hamid Karzai, the former president of Afghanistan, expressed outrage over the incident and advocated more security on Twitter.

“I hope the interim government pays particular attention to the security of educational centers and schools because the prosperity of a society is dependent on the arms of the educated youth,” he said, according to TOLOnews.

In a separate statement, condemning the incident, Nabila Massrali, the spokeswoman for foreign affairs and security policy for the European Union, expressed concern over the “horrible news of poisonings” that occurred at more than 60 girls’ schools in northern Afghanistan.

According to their duty under international law to safeguard the populace, the de facto authorities must investigate this horrific crime, the statement stated.

An education official in Afghanistan said almost 80 girls were hospitalised after being poisoned at schools, Fox News said.

According to reports, the incidents happened over Saturday and Sunday in the province of Sar-e-Pul in the north.

Mohammad Rahmani, the director of the provincial department of education, said the poisoning had occurred in the Sangcharak district among female pupils in grades 1 through 6.

He said that 60 children at Naswan-e-Kabod Aab School and 17 more at Naswan-e-Faizabad School had been poisoned, Fox News reported.

“Both primary schools are near to each other and were targeted one after the other,” he said, adding, “We shifted the students to the hospital and now they are all fine.”

The department’s investigation is ongoing and initial inquiries show that someone with a grudge paid a third party to carry out the attacks, Rahmani said, without sharing further details. He gave no information on how the girls were poisoned or the nature of their injuries, according to Fox News.

It is thought to be the first time this kind of assault has happened since the Taliban swept to power in August 2021 and began their crackdown on the rights and freedoms of Afghan women and girls.

Girls are banned from education beyond sixth grade, including university, and women are barred from most jobs and public spaces Fox News reported. The attack serves as a reminder of a wave of poisonings in neighbouring Iran targeting school-age girls, dating back to November. Thousands of students said they were sickened by noxious fumes in the incidents. (ANI)

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