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Afghan women face restrictions on Eid

Women of Baghlan and Takhar provinces in Afghanistan were under command to not go out in groups during the days of Eid al-Fitr….reports Asian Lite News

In another harsh restriction, the Taliban has prohibited women from attending Eid celebrations in two provinces of Afghanistan, Khaama Press reported.

The instructions came from the de-facto authorities for the women of Baghlan and Takhar provinces of the country on Friday to not go out in groups during the days of Eid al-Fitr. Only these two provinces in Afghanistan have up to now been under command to follow the instructions.

In the Herat region of Afghanistan, the Taliban authorities earlier this month forbade families and women from dining in establishments with gardens and outdoor space, reported Khaama Press.

The authorities said that gender mingling and not donning a headscarf (Hijab) were the reasons for the curbs.

Facing decades-long conflict, Afghanistan grapples with numerous challenges including a food shortage as foreign governments are cutting development funding and imposing sanctions, in large part due to the Taliban’s restrictions on women.

Despite widespread condemnation, there are still restrictions on how many women can work for the UN, including a ban on girls’ higher education beyond the sixth grade, the Afghan news agency reported.

Afghanistan, Sep 07 (ANI): Afghan nationals including women shout slogans during a protest outside the Pakistan embassy, in Kabul on Tuesday. (ANI Photo)

Women face unending challenges

Afghanistan’s women have faced numerous challenges since the Taliban returned to power in 2021. Girls and women in the war-torn country have no access to education, employment and public spaces.

Despite all odds, the spirit of Afghan women remains high and they are trying to push on, proving to be a shining example of self-reliance. Many like 22-year-old Sofia logs in for an online English course run by one of a growing number of educational institutes. These institutes are trying to reach Afghanistan’s girls and women who have been prevented from going to school due to the Taliban administration’s restrictions.

Sofia a Student from Kabul while expressed the problems that women in Afghanistan actually need to face for their education and said that “actually in this situation that we are banned from going school, university or (from attending) any type of courses, it is a good opportunity for girls, for women in Afghanistan to continue their education, their studies in online courses, so this is why I want to continue my studies in online courses. This is my dream; this is my goal to finish my studying whatever happens in Afghanistan”.

Girls and women desperate to get an education have since flooded online schools like Sofia’s online school, Rumi Academy, with applications.

The school says it has seen its enrolment of mostly women rise from about 50 students to more than 500 after the Taliban took over. But like anyone else in Afghanistan who uses the internet, online students are hampered by power cuts and cripplingly slow internet speeds.

Anita Sherza the founder of Rumi Academy and online education “The major concern I have regarding our activity is power outages and internet connection, if one-day power or the internet is being completely disconnected in Afghanistan, it would create a serious problem for us, and this is one the major concerns I have always had”.

Afghan women are also trying to be self-reliant by engaging themselves in business activities. They virtually joined an exhibition in Dubai to promote their carpets, jewellery, dried fruit and other handmade goods as part of a push to access international markets.

The three-day exhibition supported by the United Nations Development Program included 26 Afghan female-run businesses. Due to the difficulty of getting a visa and travel restrictions, the business owners joined via video link from Kabul.

Ziagul Jahani an Afghan businesswoman from Parwan province said that “We lost our hope when Afghanistan collapsed, we thought Afghanistan would go back 20 years, but Afghan women are fighters, we will struggle and fight. We will never allow for the loss of our businesses to happen or face stagnation, we have always fought and will continue to fight.

Facing decades-long conflict, Afghanistan grapples with numerous challenges including a food shortage as foreign governments are cutting development funding and imposing sanctions, in large part due to the Taliban’s restrictions on women.

The World Food Programme is currently short of 93 million USD, causing it to reduce rations to 4 million Afghans to 50 per cent of what they need. Another 9 million people will lose access to food aid entirely in April if it does not receive funding commitments in the coming weeks. Amid all confrontations, the Afghans have not relinquished their spirit and they are hopeful for better days ahead. (ANI)

ALSO READ: UN ready to pull out from Afghanistan

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Watchdog warns US money could be flowing to Taliban

A member of Taliban stands guard at a security checkpoint in Kandahar city, Afghanistan, Sept. 11, 2021. (Photo by Sanaullah Seiam/Xinhua/IANS)

The disclosure by the Special Inspector for Afghanistan Reconstruction comes as House Republicans are using the power of their new majority to hold the Biden administration accountable …reports Asian Lite News

The watchdog for US assistance to Afghanistan warned lawmakers Wednesday that American aid to the country could be diverted to the Taliban as he accused the Biden administration of stonewalling his efforts to investigate.

“Unfortunately, as I sit here today I cannot assure this committee or the American taxpayer, we are not currently funding the Taliban,” John Sopko, the Special Inspector for Afghanistan Reconstruction, testified to the House Oversight Committee. “Nor can I assure you that the Taliban are not diverting the money we are sending for the intended recipients, which are the poor Afghan people.”

The stunning disclosure by Sopko comes as House Republicans are using the power of their new majority to hold the Biden administration accountable over its handling of the chaotic US withdrawal in August 2021.

It also comes a week after the White House publicly released a 12-page summary of the results of the so-called “hotwash” of US policies around the ending of the nation’s longest war, taking little responsibility for its own actions and asserting that President Joe Biden was “severely constrained” by former President Donald Trump’s decisions.

Republicans, who have called Biden’s handling of Afghanistan a “catastrophe,” and a “stunning failure of leadership,” criticized the review and after-action reports conducted by the State Department and the Pentagon as partisan. The White House privately transmitted the reports to Congress last week but they remain highly classified and will not be released publicly.

Sopko initially started the job in 2012 to oversee US spending in Afghanistan when there was a large American presence in the country. But since the withdrawal, the work of the IG has shifted to monitoring the more than $8 billion dedicated to Afghanistan. The lack of US military presence in the country has made keeping track of the large sums of money flowing into the country nearly impossible, Sopko said.

Joe Biden.

He testified Wednesday to Congress that work is more complicated by the fact that the State Department and US Agency for International Development have not been cooperating with his probe since withdrawal and asked for lawmakers’ help in getting access to the necessary documents and testimony.

“We cannot abide a situation in which agencies are allowed to pick and choose what information an IG gets, or who an IG can interview, or what an IG may report on,” Sopko said in his opening testimony. “If permitted to continue, it will end SIGAR’s work in Afghanistan but also Congress’s access to independent and credible oversight of any administration.”

Sopko, who previously served in oversight roles in the House and Senate, testified that he had never seen this level of “obfuscation and delay” from any of the other previous administrations.

Republicans were quick to join in Sopko’s criticism of the administration. Even one Democrat on the committee, Rep. Kweisi Mfume, D-Md., said that he regretted the agencies’ refusal to cooperate.

“I’m going to go on the record and urge all three of those agencies today to cooperate more so that we might not be in a position of hearing what we’ve heard today or in a position of frustration like I am right now,” Mfume told Sopko during the hearing.

The White House on Wednesday called the hearing, led by Oversight Chairman James Comer, another example of House Republicans’ “political stunts.”

“You can expect they will continue to falsely claim that the Biden Administration has ‘obstructed’ oversight — despite the fact that we have provided thousands of pages of documents, analyzes, spreadsheets, and written responses to questions, as well as hundreds of briefings to bipartisan Members and staff and public congressional testimony by senior officials, all while consistently providing updates and information to numerous inspectors general,” Ian Sams, a spokesperson for the White House counsel’s office, said in a statement.

A spokesperson for USAID said Wednesday that the agency “has consistently provided SIGAR responses to hundreds of questions, as well as thousands of pages of responsive documents, analyzes, and spreadsheets describing dozens of programs that were part of the US government’s reconstruction effort in Afghanistan.”

A request for comment from the State Department was not immediately returned.

Since the withdrawal, SIGAR has released several reports, nearly all of them critical of both Biden and Trump’s handling of how to remove US troops from Afghanistan in its final months.

Over the past two years, Sopko said his staff has requested numerous documents and interviews with officials who were involved in the withdrawal but had been stonewalled. He said those requests involved information about the evacuation and resettlement of Afghan nationals as well as ongoing humanitarian aid and questions about whether that assistance might be transferred to the Taliban.

“It sounds like you’re a Republican member of Congress because Republican members of Congress send letters over to the administration and we don’t get answers either,” Rep. Byron Donalds, R-Fla., told Sopko during his testimony.

Despite the so-called stonewalling, Sopko said that he and his agents have been able to compile interviews with around 800 current and former US employees who were involved both in the war in Afghanistan and the withdrawal.

“I think we had more sources in Afghanistan than all the other IGs combined and the GAO. So we’re still trying to get that information, but the best information, like actual contract data, and actually the names of people is best and it should by law come from State and AID,” Sopko said.

ALSO READ: UN ready to pull out from Afghanistan

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UN ready to pull out from Afghanistan

The UN is negotiating with the Taliban in hopes that it will make exceptions to a decree prohibiting local women from working for the organization….reports Asian Lite News

The UN has said it is ready to withdraw from Afghanistan in May if it cannot convince the Taliban to permit local women to work for the organization, the head of the UN Development Program said, Afghanistan-based Khaama Press reported.

The UN is negotiating with the Taliban in hopes that it will make exceptions to a decree prohibiting local women from working for the organization. UNDP Administrator, Achin Steiner, said: “It is fair to say that where we are right now is the entire United Nations system having to take a step back and re-evaluate its ability to operate there. But it is not about negotiating fundamental principles, human rights.”

The United Nations recently expressed “serious concerns” after the Afghan female UN staff members were banned from reporting to work in the eastern province of Afghanistan, Nangarhar, Afghanistan-based Khaama Press reported.

The UN said: “The United Nations in Afghanistan expresses serious concern that female national UN staff have been prevented from reporting to work in Nangarhar province.”

The UN warned the Taliban that the life-saving aid would be at risk without female staff since most of the International organization’s staff are female.

“We remind de facto authorities that United Nations entities cannot operate and deliver life-saving assistance without female staff,” the UN said on Twitter, Khaama Press reported.

International organizations, including the UN, have repeatedly expressed their concerns over excluding women from the aid sector, saying that without female staff, the organizations will be unable to reach needy women.

The Taliban since it came to power in Afghanistan in August 2021, has imposed bans on women and girls, preventing them from education and employment.

The Taliban first banned girls from going to school beyond sixth grade; in December 2022, a decree prohibited Afghan women from higher education and working with national and international NGOs.

The suppressive restrictions on women are confronted with massive criticism by national and international organizations warning that it will disrupt the humanitarian aid to the most needful people of Afghanistan, according to Khaama Press. (ANI)

ALSO READ: Russia, EU concern over illegal immigration from Pakistan

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Crisis-hit Pakistan blames Kabul for TTP problem

Differences between the two countries have been sustained over the frequent violation of Afghan air space by the Pakistani forces citing the disputed ‘Durand Line’…reports Asian Lite News

Pakistani government and military do not seem to have a way out from facing persistent attacks from the banned Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). The demands of TTP have varied over time, and the group has been using violence as means to make Pakistan accept them. One of its major demands of withdrawal of troops from the tribal areas of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) is a sore point with the Pakistani Army. The recent spike in attacks by TTP has made the civil as well as military leadership blame the Taliban for the problem, Afghan Diaspora reported.

Pakistan security forces have increased activity in the border areas and tightened controls at the border crossings since the TTP ended a cease-fire with the government in November 2022. Reportedly, a high-level Afghan delegation led by the country’s Chief of Directorate of Intelligence Abdul Haq Wasiq recently visited Rawalpindi to discuss the issue with the high command of Pakistan’s Army. Pakistan’s chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee Gen. Sahir Shamshad Mirza is said to have put some impractical demands before the delegation including banning TTP in Afghanistan. The Pakistani side also asked for Afghan support in eliminating TTP Emir Mufti Noor Wali Mehsud and other leaders, Afghan Diaspora reported.

Differences between the two countries have been sustained over the frequent violation of Afghan air space by the Pakistani forces citing the disputed ‘Durand Line’. Pakistan’s vindictive insistence on its own view manifests into cruel attacks by its Army on poor tribals living through uncertainty for more than a century now.

Lately, there have been many instances of unprovoked firing by Pakistani forces on civilians crossing ‘the border’. The Afghan provinces of Helmand, Nangarhar, Kunar, and Khost have suffered the most on this count.

Against Pakistan’s claims of being a victim of terrorism, the Taliban regime continues to highlight the sufferings of Afghan nationals at the border and inside Pakistan.

While the border areas remain combat zones, poor Afghans living in the interiors of Pakistan are not spared either. A few months ago, several reports which went viral contained audio/videos of Afghans in the custody of Pakistani authorities, Afghan Diaspora reported.

The harassment extends to Afghan females who are hassled at border crossings on the pretext of security. While the incessant violence has prompted Pakistan to contain the spread of TTP, the approach adopted by it is hardly realistic. Blaming the Taliban for all the ills in the north-western region has not been productive and is expected to stay the same.

Instead, Islamabad needs to acknowledge the fault lines that lie within its policies and its attitude towards Pashtuns. Years of neglect and discrimination have made the tribes take up arms and a solution to their problems cannot come from some other country, Afghan Diaspora reported. (ANI)

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Kabul-Kandahar power struggle intensifies

Taliban Supremo Haibatullah Akhundzada

Experts say Akhundzada’s decision to relocate the offices of two Taliban spokesmen to Kandahar is part of efforts to tighten his grip on power…reports Asian Lite News

Afghanistan’s southern city of Kandahar is the historical birthplace and the political base of the Taliban. Now, the country’s second-largest city appears to be becoming the de facto capital under the militant groups rule, according to a media report.

Several officials have recently been transferred from capital Kabul to Kandahar. Taliban’s supreme leader Mullah Haibatullah Akhundzada lives in the city and rarely leaves the Pashtun heartland in southern Afghanistan, RFE/RL reported.

Experts say Akhundzada’s decision to relocate the offices of two Taliban spokesmen to Kandahar is part of efforts to tighten his grip on power. The move comes amid growing reports of infighting between key Taliban ministers based in Kabul and a powerful group of clerics led by Akhundzada in Kandahar.

“It looks like political power is being transferred from Kabul to Kandahar,” Sami Yousafzai, a veteran Afghan journalist and commentator said, RFE/RL reported, adding, “[Akhundzada] is creating a parallel administration to the one in Kabul.”

In recent months, senior Taliban officials have appeared to criticise Akhundzada, accusing him of monopolising power and empowering ultraconservative clerics who share his extremist views.

Akhundzada, a hard-line cleric and former chief justice, has the ultimate say on all important matters under the Taliban’s clerical system.

After the Taliban seized power in 2021, ministers carried out the day-to-day administration of the Taliban government. But in recent months, Akhundzada has sought to micromanage the affairs of the state, said Yousufzai, RFE/RL reported.

Zabihullah Mujahid, the Taliban’s chief spokesman, relocated his office from Kabul to Kandahar on April 6, according to Abdul Mateen Qani, a spokesman for the Ministry of Information and Culture.

Innamullah Samangani, another key government spokesman and head of the Taliban’s Media and Information Centre, was also recently transferred to Kandahar, RFE/RL reported.

Andrew Watkins, a senior Afghanistan expert at United States Institute of Peace, a think-tank in Washington, said Mujahid’s transfer is one of the most public signs of a trend in which Akhundzada appears to be strengthening his influence.

Watkins said Akhundzada wants control over “public messaging,” which he says has “long been a priority for the Taliban”, RFE/RL reported.

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Pak envoy returns to Kabul after 4 months

The return of the top diplomat came just days after Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari spoke to Acting Afghan Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi….reports Asian Lite News

Ubaid-ur-Rehman Nizamani, Pakistan’s head of the diplomatic mission in Kabul, has returned to the Afghan capital more than four months after he survived an assassination attempt.

Foreign Office spokesperson Mumtaz Zahra Baloch confirmed that the Pakistani charge d’affaires returned to Kabul on Monday, The Express Tribune reported.

The return of the top diplomat came just days after Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari spoke to Acting Afghan Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi.

Sources said the decision to send back the Pakistani acting ambassador was taken during the telephone call.

Nizamani was on a routine walk inside the embassy compound in Kabul on December 2, 2022, when shooters opened fire at him from a nearby multi-storey building.

He escaped unhurt, but his Pakistani security guard sustained bullet injuries in the legs. Pakistan immediately evacuated the chief diplomat and demanded the Taliban enhance the security of its embassy, The Express Tribune reported.

However, it was not clear at the time that it would take over four months for Pakistan to send back its envoy to Kabul.

The delay was attributed to a lack of security as well as friction between the two sides on a range of issues, particularly the continued attacks by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) terror group.

The development came ahead of the visit of Muttaqi to Pakistan.

The sources said Bilawal extended the formal invitation to his Afghan counterpart during the telephonic conversation.

Though no official confirmation was available, the sources said Muttaqi is expected to travel to Islamabad in the first week of May, The Express Tribune reported.

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70 aircraft left behind by US become operational

Taliban claims Black Hawk helicopter also repaired as 70 aircraft left behind by US become operational.(photo:IN)

Afghanistan has repaired an American UH60 Black Hawk chopper and a Russian Mi-17 helicopter, reports Rahul Kumar

The Defence Minister of Afghanistan claims that the country has repaired two more military helicopters – one Russian and one American. These include a Russian Mi-17 helicopter and an American UH60 Black Hawk chopper.

A tweet by the Afghan Ministry of Defence says: “As a result of continuous efforts of the technical team of the relevant forces of the Ministry of National Defence, two helicopters, one (Russian Mi-17 and the other American UH60 Black Hawk) helicopter, repaired and successfully conducted a test flight.”

Air Force Commander Maulvi Abdul Ghaffar Mohammadi has vowed to build and repair other damaged aircraft in the future. Afghanistan news agency Ariana News had reported in December 2022 that the country has been able to repair more than sixty helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft.

A report by Anadolu Agency in December 2022 said the Taliban repaired 70 military planes and helicopters damaged by American soldiers before leaving in 2021. It quoted the Afghan Defence Ministry spokesman Inayatullah Khawarizmi as saying that the US aircraft were in use by the Afghan Air Force, adding that the Taliban did not have a single working aircraft when it took over power.

The mystery of how the Taliban repaired American equipment seems to lie in the Taliban’s persuasive power to call back nearly 40 pilots and technicians who had fled Afghanistan during the chaotic American withdrawal. These Afghans seem to be bringing back to life military planes which the Americans had convinced the world would never fly as these were too sophisticated and had been rendered useless.

In the midst of anxiety-filled uncertainty, Afghan pilots had flown nearly 50 aircraft to Uzbekistan and Tajikistan in 2021 as Taliban fighters conquered province after province facing little resistance.

A report by the US Department of Defence (DoD), had said in mid-2022 that, “The DoD estimated that US-funded equipment valued at $7.12 billion was in the inventory of the former Afghan government when it collapsed, much of which has since been seized by the Taliban. This included military aircraft, ground vehicles, weapons, and other military equipment.”

The report added that “the condition of these items was unknown, and the long-term operability of the vehicles was likely to deteriorate without US contractor maintenance. The US military removed or destroyed nearly all major equipment used by US troops in Afghanistan throughout the drawdown period in 2021.”

However, the steady flow of news from Kabul seems to indicate the opposite.

The hi-tech military hardware that the US left behind in war-torn Afghanistan in the wake of its unplanned withdrawal has the neighbourhood in fear. Reports say that Afghan militant groups are already using US weapons in Pakistan against the local security forces.

(The content is being carried under an arrangement with indianarrative.com)

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Kazakhstan to reopen embassy, consulate, claims Baradar

Afghanistan has diplomatic missions in Tehran, Istanbul, Islamabad, Dubai, Moscow, Beijing, and a number of Arab and African nations, but no nation has recognized the Taliban….reports Asian Lite News

Acting First Deputy Prime Minister of Afghanistan for Economic Affairs under the caretaker Taliban regime, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar has said that Kazakhstan’s deputy prime minister and Minister of Trade and Integration Serik Zhumangarin has pledged to reopen Afghan Embassy, Consulate in Kazakhstan, Afghanistan based Tolo News reported.

As per Baradar, the Islamic Emirate is working on improving interactions with the world. Baradar noted, “They indicated this … yesterday, that we will reopen our embassy or consulate in Afghanistan and assured us that we can also reopen our embassy and consulate there.”

As per Tolo News, a delegation of Kazakhstan, led by the deputy prime minister and minister of trade and integration, visited Kabul on Saturday and had meetings with a number of senior officials of the Islamic Emirate, including Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar.

The Taliban in order to improve relations asked this high-ranking Kazakh official to receive Taliban diplomats.

Former diplomat Noorullah Raghi, however, said that “Sending and accepting diplomats without official recognition … is a one-way relationship and has one-sided benefits.”

“If in general the international community, US, European Union, Russia, China does not give recognition, I don’t think other countries will recognize the Islamic Emirate,” Raghi said.

Afghanistan has diplomatic missions in Tehran, Istanbul, Islamabad, Dubai, Moscow, Beijing, and a number of Arab and African nations, but no nation has recognized the Taliban.

Last week, China, Russia, Iran and Pakistan in the second informal meeting among their Foreign ministers, released a joint statement calling on Taliban to form an inclusive government.

The meeting was held in Samarkand, Uzbekistan, in the framework of the 4th Ministers’ meeting of Afghanistan’s neighbouring countries. A joint statement called on the Taliban to form an inclusive government with the participation of all ethnic groups and political institutions.

The statement also asked the Taliban to lift all restriction measures against women and ethnic minorities in the country.

The statement also emphasized that a peaceful Afghanistan is in the international community’s interest and that the country should be a place for international cooperation rather than geopolitical rivalry, according to Khaama Press.

The US and its allies were blamed for the current state of affairs in the country and asked for the immediate lifting of unilateral sanctions against Afghanistan and releasing its assets to benefit the people.

Russia, China, Iran and Pakistan also expressed concern about the security situation and the growing terrorism in Afghanistan. It reiterated that terrorist groups based in Afghanistan severely threaten regional and global peace.

The countries asked Taliban to “take tangible action in fighting against terrorism and eliminating terrorist groups in the country.”

Taliban spokesperson Zabiullah Mujahid recently called on the international community to pursue engagement instead of putting pressure on the Taliban, Afghanistan-based TOLO News reported.

It has been two years since the Taliban came to power in Afghanistan, but no countries have yet recognized it.

“Pressure, imposition of pressure and threats, these methods should be put aside, and they should engage with the Islamic Emirate so that the Islamic Emirate can take responsible actions regarding some issues, some laws and other issues in the world,” Mujahid said, as quoted by TOLO News reported.

Mujahid in an interview with Afghanistan-based television channel Radio Television Afghanistan (RTA) said that Daesh has been controlled and conducts attacks secretly and is considered a “1 per cent problem.” (ANI)

ALSO READ: Taliban outlaw video games, music and foreign films

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Taliban outlaw video games, music and foreign films

Taliban

In the years before the Taliban retook power in August 2021, Hazratha Market was the centre of video gaming in Herat.

The Taliban-led Afghan government has banned video games, foreign films and music in the western city of Herat, branding them as un-Islamic, the media reported.

The ban imposed by the Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, which came without warning, has forced more than 400 businesses in Herat to close, RFE/RL reported.

It followed crackdowns on other forms of leisure and entertainment that clash with the Taliban’s extremist interpretation of Islamic Shari’a law.

Earlier this month, also in Herat, the Taliban closed restaurant gardens for women and families.

In October 2022, the group shut cafes offering hookahs — the smoking of which is a popular pastime among Afghan men — across the country.

Earlier in May, the Taliban banned men and women from eating together in Herat’s restaurants and shut down women-owned and women-run restaurants in the city, RFE/RL reported.

The hard-line Islamist group has aggressively re-imposed draconian restrictions on how Afghans can appear in public and how men and women interact, reminiscent of its brutal reign through the late 1990s before it was displaced by a US-led military invasion and a UN-backed government for two decades.

Male Afghan students are seen in a university in Herat city, Herat province, Afghanistan.(Photo by Mashal/Xinhua/IANS)

The impact of Taliban restrictions on businesses is conspicuous in Herat, an ancient centre of cultural and intellectual life in the Muslim world that lies at a strategic crossroads leading to Iran and Turkmenistan.

In the years before the Taliban retook power in August 2021, Hazratha Market was the centre of video gaming in Herat.

Scores of shops lining narrow corridors also sold foreign films and TV serials on DVD. They offered Indian, Iranian, and Western music on CDs and cassettes, RFE/RL reported.

But the once-teeming market that echoed with Afghan and Iranian music has now fallen silent and almost all its shops are closed.

The officials of the Taliban’s morality police in Herat are adamant that closing game arcades and movie and music shops was the right thing to do.

Mawlawi Azizurrahman Mohajir, the provincial head of the Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, said the authorities closed the gaming parlours after many families complained that their children were wasting time there.

“These shops were selling films that depicted and promoted Indian and Western values and culture, which are very different from Afghan culture and traditions,” he told Radio Azadi.

Mohajir, too, repeated the familiar Taliban argument that it considers such everyday leisure activities un-Islamic.

“The films they were selling did not have women in hijab, which is against Sharia,” he said, referring to the strict interpretation of the Islamic dress code that the Taliban insists be followed in Afghanistan.

“This is why the sale of such films is prohibited.”

ALSO READ: Neighbours urge Taliban to form inclusive govt

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Neighbours urge Taliban to form inclusive govt

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu (1st R) meets with Afghanistan's acting Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi (1st L) in Ankara, Turkey, on Oct. 14, 2021. (Photo by Mustafa Kaya/Xinhua/IANS)

The foreign ministers of China, Russia, Iran and Pakistan met in Samarkand, Uzbekistan, in the framework of the 4th Ministers’ meeting of Afghanistan’s neighbouring countries….reports Asian Lite News

China, Russia, Iran and Pakistan in the second informal meeting among their Foreign ministers on Thursday, released a joint statement calling on Taliban to form an inclusive government, Pakistan based Khaama Press reported.

The meeting was held in Samarkand, Uzbekistan, in the framework of the 4th Ministers’ meeting of Afghanistan’s neighbouring countries. A joint statement called on the Taliban to form an inclusive government with the participation of all ethnic groups and political institutions.

The statement also asked the Taliban to lift all restriction measures against women and ethnic minorities in the country.

The statement also emphasized that a peaceful Afghanistan is in the international community’s interest and that the country should be a place for international cooperation rather than geopolitical rivalry, according to Khaama Press.

The US and its allies were blamed for the current state of affairs in the country and asked for the immediate lifting of unilateral sanctions against Afghanistan and releasing its assets to benefit the people.

Russia, China, Iran and Pakistan also expressed concern about the security situation and the growing terrorism in Afghanistan. It reiterated that terrorist groups based in Afghanistan severely threaten regional and global peace.

The countries asked Taliban to “take tangible action in fighting against terrorism and eliminating terrorist groups in the country.”

Taliban spokesperson Zabiullah Mujahid recently called on the international community to pursue engagement instead of putting pressure on the Taliban, Afghanistan-based TOLO News reported.

It has been two years since the Taliban came to power in Afghanistan, but no countries have yet recognized it.

“Pressure, imposition of pressure and threats, these methods should be put aside, and they should engage with the Islamic Emirate so that the Islamic Emirate can take responsible actions regarding some issues, some laws and other issues in the world,” Mujahid said, as quoted by TOLO News reported.

Mujahid in an interview with Afghanistan-based television channel Radio Television Afghanistan (RTA) said that Daesh has been controlled and conducts attacks secretly and is considered a “1 per cent problem.”

Clerics call for women education

As Afghan females continue to suffer under Taliban’s hardline regime, religious clerics of the country have called upon the Taliban to ensure access of educational opportunities, TOLOnews reported.

The hijab shouldn’t be used as a justification to prohibit women from receiving an education, according to Abdul Sami Ghaznavi, a lecturer at the Central Jihadi Madrasa, and teaching women is one of the responsibilities of the Islamic government, the Afghan news agency reported. “Education is not a problem in the eyes of Sharia. Mohammadullah Mohsen, another religious cleric, stated that Islam necessitates that we comprehend and receive education.”

Meanwhile, once more, female students requested from the current administration that schools be opened for them.

“There has been no word about the opening of our schools this year, just like last year.

We are surrounded by uncertainty,” explained student Maryam, according to TOLOnews.

“Under any conditions offered by the current government, all Afghan girls are prepared to continue their studies. It is enough that they open the doors of the schools to us as soon as possible,” another student Fawzia said.

Since 15 August 2021, the de facto authorities have barred girls from attending secondary school, restricted women and girls’ freedom of movement, excluded women from most areas of the workforce and banned women from using parks, gyms, and public bath houses.

Moreover, time and again the UN Security Council has expressed concern over the Taliban’s decision to ban girls from attending school above the sixth grade in Afghanistan.

These restrictions culminate with the confinement of Afghan women and girls to the four walls of their homes. (ANI)

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