President Trump has promised a bold new American approach to the world. Nowhere is that more urgently needed than in Afghanistan. Not only have its Taliban rulers crushed dissent and stripped away the rights of the country’s women and girls; they have also taken Americans hostage and are allowing Afghanistan to serve as a nerve … Read more
In one of its final acts, the Biden administration secured the release of two Americans held in Afghanistan in a prisoner swap for a Taliban member imprisoned in the United States on narcotics charges. The Taliban government freed Ryan Corbett and William Wallace McKenty in exchange for Khan Mohammed, who was released from a U.S. … Read more
Wood shavings littered the floor of Sakhi’s cramped workshop in the Afghan city of Herat as another rubab, the national musical instrument of his homeland, took shape under his deft hands.Sakhi has crafted two rubabs a month for decades, and he refuses to set down his tools even as a Taliban crackdown strangles music in … Read more
Police in the Afghan capital say a suicide bomber carried out an attack Monday (September 2, 2024), killing at least six people and injuring 13 others. The blast took place in the southwestern Qala Bakhtiar neighbourhood in Kabul, said Khalid Zadran, spokesman for the Kabul police chief. The dead included one woman, he said, while … Read more
File picture of police officers examine the site of suicide bombing at a highway in Shangla, a district in the Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, on March 26, 2024. | Photo Credit: AP The Taliban defence ministry on Wednesday rejected Pakistan’s allegations that Afghans were involved in an attack on Chinese engineers, as ties between the … Read more
Taliban forces patrol near the entrance gate of Hamid Karzai International Airport. File | Photo Credit: Reuters Russia said on Tuesday it had important matters to discuss with Afghanistan’s Taliban leaders and was working to remove the Taliban from its list of banned terrorist organisations. “This is a country that is next to us, and … Read more
The Taliban carried out a double public execution at a stadium in southeastern Afghanistan on Thursday. A crowd of thousands, including an AP journalist, witnessed the executions, which occurred in the Ali Lala area of Ghazni city. The Taliban did not respond to requests for information about the people who were executed or their alleged … Read more
Amid heightened tensions between Pakistan and Iran, Afghanistan‘s Taliban administration has urged the two countries to show restraint. Taliban spokesperson Abdul Qahar Balkhi on Thursday tweeted, “The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan considers the recent violence between the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Islamic Republic of Pakistan alarming, and … Read more
File photo of Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi (L) posing with China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Kabul in 2022. | Photo Credit: AFP China said on December 5 Afghanistan’s Taliban government will need to introduce political reforms, improve security and mend relations with its neighbours before receiving full diplomatic recognition. Beijing does not … Read more
The story so far: On October 31, the Torkham Crossing — five kilometres west of Khyber Pass, on the border connecting Pakistan’s Peshawar with Afghanistan’s Jalalabad — saw a sudden influx of at least 24,000 Afghan refugees packed in trucks and convoys, with whatever luggage they could take from demolished homes. Some crossed over, while … Read more