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Flights in Afghanistan grounded after internet shutdown

October 1, 2025
Mahfouz Zubaide,Hafizullah Maroof and Anbarasan Ethirajan, Global Affairs Reporter
BBC News
30 September 2025

Afghanistan’s main airport is at a standstill as the country grapples with the fallout of a nationwide internet shutdown imposed by the Taliban government.

The Taliban has yet to give an official reason for the decision, which took effect on Monday, but did say it would last until further notice. The UN said it risked inflicting significant harm.

Communication within Afghanistan, and out to the wider world, has been severely affected, as have essential services – including banking and payments – and access to online education, a lifeline for many women and girls.

Kabul airport, meanwhile, was “nearly deserted”, according to one resident, with no evidence of planes arriving or leaving.

One passenger who planned to fly into Kabul International Airport on Tuesday was told there would be no flights until Thursday at the earliest.

Another local said all flights from Kabul airport had been cancelled since Monday evening.

He added that life in Kabul “seems to be normal”, but added that there was “no communication at all” across the country.

The United Nations mission in Afghanistan called on the Taliban authorities to immediately and fully restore nationwide internet and telecommunications access.

“The cut in access has left Afghanistan almost completely cut off from the outside world, and risks inflicting significant harm on the Afghan people, including by threatening economic stability and exacerbating one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises,” it said in a statement.

‘We are blind without internet’

The Taliban government have for weeks been severing fibre-optic internet connections across several provinces.

It began in a handful of provinces, but did not impact the capital Kabul until Monday, with several people telling the BBC their fibre-optic internet stopped working towards the end of the working day, around 17:00 local time (12:30 GMT).

And on Tuesday, many awoke across the country to find essential services paralysed.

Najibullah, a 42-year-old shopkeeper in Kabul, told news agency AFP that residents felt like they were left “blind without phones and internet”.

“All our business relies on mobiles. The deliveries are with mobiles. It’s like a holiday, everyone is at home. The market is totally frozen.”

Another Kabul local, who did not wish to be identified, said that banks across the capital were open, but that there were huge crowds wanting to withdraw money, but that only “very little cash” could be paid out.

However, a money changer in the country’s southern Helmand province said all banks in his area were closed and that he was not able to process payments.

Diplomatic officials had earlier warned the BBC that the internet cuts could affect banking and e-commerce systems nationwide.

International news agencies also say they have lost contact with offices in the capital Kabul. Mobile internet and satellite TV has also been severely disrupted across the country.

Tolo News, a privately owned Afghan news channel, told people to follow its social media pages for updates as it expected disruptions to its television and radio networks.

One Kabul journalist told the BBC that they were unable to even call or contact guests for interviews, and needed to send camera crews directly to their interviewees’ homes.

“We have never experienced such [a] thing,” he added.

Several residents, who requested anonymity, previously told the BBC that their businesses and lives had been seriously affected by the internet cuts.

A man who works as a money changer in Takhar province said that his daughters’ online English classes were disrupted. “Their last opportunity to study and stay engaged is now gone,” he said.

Another woman previously told the BBC that she could not attend online classes since her home internet was cut off. “I had hoped to finish my studies and find an online job, but that dream has also been destroyed,” she said. “Without internet access, I don’t know what will happen next.”

In an earlier post on social network Mastodon.social, Netblocks had said the country was “in the midst of a total internet blackout as Taliban authorities move to implement morality measures, with multiple networks disconnected through the morning in a stepwise manner; telephone services are currently also impacted”.

A spokesperson for the Taliban governor in Balkh wrote on X earlier this month that the ban on fibre-optic internet was meant to curb “evils”. He added that authorities would explore alternatives.

It is unclear exactly what the reason for this week’s shutdown is.

The shutdown is the latest in a series of restrictions which the Taliban have enforced since returning to power.

Earlier this month they removed books written by women from the country’s university teaching system as part of a new ban which has also outlawed the teaching of human rights and sexual harassment.

Women and girls have also been particularly hard-hit: they are barred from accessing education beyond the age of 12, with one of their last routes to further training cut off in late 2024, when midwifery courses were quietly shut down.

A university student told the BBC that she had “no other choice except online study” after her midwifery course was banned. “When I heard that the internet had been cut, the world felt dark to me,” she said.

The Taliban retook control of Afghanistan in 2021 in a lightning advance, weeks after the withdrawal of US and other international forces.

Flights in Afghanistan grounded after internet shutdown
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Five Takeaways About the Culture of Lawlessness in the U.S. Special Forces

October 1, 2025
By Matthieu Aikins

Until now, many of the troubling events that took place during the war in Afghanistan have been shrouded in secrecy.

This troubling history has been shrouded by the Army’s intense secrecy around its operators. In the past four years, I interviewed two dozen current and former members of Army Special Operations, including some who were willing to publicly accuse the organization of misconduct. The Times filed lawsuits that yielded thousands of pages of previously unpublished investigations, detainee files and other military records. To track down and interview scores of local witnesses, I made multiple trips to Afghanistan, where I have been reporting since 2008.

A spokeswoman for Army Special Operations, Lt. Col. Allie Scott, defended the organization. “We have fully investigated and adjudicated the cases you cover,” she wrote. “We are confident our actions stand up to the strictest scrutiny.”

Until now, it hasn’t been possible to reckon with many of these events because they were kept secret. Doing so helps us to understand not only the toll of the war on the U.S’s elite forces but also our current political moment, as the Trump administration loosens restraints on the military, orders lethal military strikes on alleged Venezuelan “narco-terrorists” in the Caribbean and deploys troops to American cities.

Here are five takeaways from the four-part magazine investigation.

A Green Beret’s Confession Outraged the Military. Then He Found an Ally in Trump.
Nine Bodies Turned Up at a Green Beret Outpost. What Really Happened?
How War-Crime Accusations Against Green Berets Were Denied and Buried
They Celebrated Vigilante Justice on the Battlefield. Then They Brought It Home.

Deployed on isolated firebases in violent enemy territory in Afghanistan, some Green Berets developed practices that skirted or even broke Army regulations, ones that were often tolerated by commanders for the sake of the mission. But rule-breaking could escalate into more serious crimes. The operators I spoke to told me they had employed Afghan guards and translators for offensive firepower and used local forces to hold detainees. Some soldiers carried “drop guns” that they could plant on bodies.

A number of Green Berets were convicted in corruption-related cases. Others were accused of extrajudicial killings. Many of them came from the Third Special Forces Group, which had a lead role in the mission in Afghanistan.

After a team of Green Berets and their secret Afghan proxy force were accused in 2012 of killing nine detainees in Nerkh, a farming district in Wardak Province, Special Operations commanders carried out three investigations — and cleared the unit.

But after local protests, the Special Forces were pushed to leave Nerkh, and human remains identified as the missing nine were found outside their base. The Army opened a criminal investigation that lasted for nearly a decade. Until now, its results have never been revealed.

Through a lawsuit, I also obtained files from the military’s three initial investigations, which show that commanders ignored clear evidence of misconduct by the team. A retired Green Beret brigadier general I spoke to agreed.

At a job interview with the C.I.A., Maj. Mathew Golsteyn admitted to killing a bombmaking suspect in Afghanistan in 2010. Golsteyn — who told me he had done the right thing for his men and his mission — was kicked out of the Special Forces. When he went public, the Army pushed to court-martial him for murder.

I obtained previously unreported files from the Golsteyn investigation that show how Army commanders pressured former members of his team into confessing their role in dismembering and burning the body of the bombmaking suspect. The Army’s actions stand in stark contrast to the Nerkh case, in which the bodies of nine detainees were found outside a former U.S. base. The case file I obtained showed that investigators amassed substantial evidence of misconduct, but the case was quietly closed by the Army without charges in 2022. Members of the Nerkh team were decorated and promoted.

Golsteyn told me he believed that his true crime was breaking the Green Berets’ code of silence.

In recent years, Army Special Operations has been plagued by murders, drug-trafficking, fraud and sex crimes committed by its soldiers. Many of these were committed around Fort Bragg, N.C., headquarters to both Army Special Operations and the Third Special Forces Group.

The problem of crime has led to questions in Congress, where military leaders promised accountability. Yet Special Forces commanders whose soldiers were involved in misconduct have been repeatedly promoted.

Pete Hegseth, a former Fox News host, rose to prominence in part through his vociferous defense of Golsteyn and other service members accused of war crimes. “They’re not war criminals; they’re warriors,” he said in 2019, shortly before Golsteyn and others received a pardon from President Trump.

In the current administration, Trump and Hegseth have pushed to loosen legal restraints on the armed forces, both abroad and in the United States, and to expand the role of the military at home. They have purged the military’s top lawyers, deployed active-duty troops to patrol American streets and authorized lethal strikes on those they designate as “narco-terrorists,” summary killings that experts say violate international law.

On Sept. 30, Hegseth spoke against “stupid rules of engagement” at a hastily organized meeting of top military officials, and Trump defended his domestic troop deployments, saying, “We should use some of these dangerous cities as training grounds for our military.”

The article reveals that the vision of unbridled power held by the Trump administration has its roots in the lawlessness of the United States’ wars overseas.
Read the full investigation
A Green Beret’s Confession Outraged the Military. Then He Found an Ally in Trump.
Sept. 30, 2025
Nine Bodies Turned Up at a Green Beret Outpost. What Really Happened?
Sept. 30, 2025
How War-Crime Accusations Against Green Berets Were Denied and Buried
Sept. 30, 2025
They Celebrated Vigilante Justice on the Battlefield. Then They Brought It Home.
Sept. 30, 2025
Five Takeaways About the Culture of Lawlessness in the U.S. Special Forces
read more

Afghan Internet Back After 2-Day Blackout Tied to Taliban

October 1, 2025

By Elian Peltier and Safiullah Padshah

Reporting from Islamabad, Pakistan, and Kabul, Afghanistan

The New York Times

No reason was immediately given for why service resumed after a blackout rare in scope, even for a government that has drastically curtailed individual freedoms.

Internet access was restored across parts of Afghanistan on Wednesday, two days after a sudden nationwide shutdown paralyzed the economy, grounded planes and led to swirling rumors about the reasons behind the blackout.

The internet outage, coupled with a suspension of cellphone services, deepened a sense of dread and uncertainty for millions of Afghans already feeling isolated by the drastic restrictions on individual freedoms imposed by the Taliban government.

The absence of public communication from Taliban figures and the claims by government that they could explain neither the shutdown nor the service resumption sowed confusion and anger.

“I want the government to make it clear: Why is the internet cut off? And how long it will last?” Aqa Gul Panjshiri, a trader importing food items, care products and cigarettes into Afghanistan, said before service resumed on Wednesday.

“I still don’t have the reason for the internet cutoff,” Inayatullah Alokozay, the spokesman for the Afghan ministry of telecommunications, said Wednesday evening.

While the reason for the shutdown remained unclear, its origin was not, according to an international diplomatic assessment whose authenticity was verified by The New York Times, and three former and current foreign officials based in the region. They attributed it to a new order by Afghanistan’s leader, Sheikh Haibatullah Akhundzada.

The shutdown came a few weeks after Mr. Akhundzada ordered a crackdown on the internet that affected about half the country’s 34 provinces in mid-September.

While mobile internet remained available when earlier restrictions were imposed, all forms of telecommunications went suddenly offline shortly after 5 p.m. on Monday. That suggested a coordinated move to cut the country off, said an Afghan telecommunications engineer who worked on national technology infrastructure projects before the Taliban’s return to power. The engineer spoke on the condition of anonymity to avoid retaliation.

Hundreds of thousands of girls who rely on the internet for online education because the Taliban have banned schooling girls beyond sixth grade, were cut off from the rest of the world.

For all the restrictions that the Taliban have imposed in recent years, none matched the scale of the countrywide shutdown, residents and foreign diplomats said.

Until now, the Taliban had limited themselves to imposing brief, localized shutdowns, including in Kabul, the capital, shortly after they seized power to prevent protests against their rule. They have also restricted access to some platforms, like TikTok, and prevented content creators from posting videos on YouTube.

The crackdown is reminiscent of the Taliban’s first years in power, when they banned internet use from 1996 to 2001. Today’s Afghanistan, however, presents a different picture. Smartphone use has proliferated with the expansion of 4G networks in recent years, and countless Afghans use social media platforms, mobile money applications and other online services every day.

Mr. Panjshiri, the trader, said he had been unable to track a container with $150,000 worth of goods, or to receive money from clients that he said he needed to pay 15 employees.

“After the takeover I trusted the government and I didn’t take my investment out of the country, he said, “but now everything is confusing and I can’t make a decision.”

Senior foreign officials and foreign diplomats posted in the region described the move to shut down the internet as reckless. Humanitarian workers said they could not do their work, and were hampered in their response to the aftermath of an earthquake last month that left more than 2,200 dead, or the accommodation of more than 2.7 million Afghans who have returned to Afghanistan from neighboring Iran and Pakistan this year.

One senior humanitarian officer working for an international organization said the outage made it impossible to track its workers in the field and keep them safe. Half of Afghanistan’s 43 million people need humanitarian assistance, according to the United Nations.

Jawad Mohammadi, a resident of Mazar-i-Sharif, in northern Afghanistan, had traveled to Kabul with his brother, who was suffering from severe kidney stones and needed to be hospitalized. Doctors had recommended immediate surgery, but Mr. Mohammadi, 37, was struggling to gather funds from relatives.

“The hospital refuses to proceed with the operation unless we pay in advance,” he said while the internet was still down.

Service resumed across the country the same way it had cut out two days earlier: abruptly, and with no announcement.

In Kabul, the sound of calls and the buzz of notifications filled the streets as night fell and residents reconnected with friends and family. Taliban government workers stepped out of their offices, sitting casually on the grass and catching up on time lost on WhatsApp, the favored communication platform among the group’s members.

Mr. Mohammadi, whose brother was in the hospital, said he had been able to reach his family. “They will send the money tomorrow,” he said.

Zia ur-Rehman and Francesca Regalado contributed reporting.

Afghan Internet Back After 2-Day Blackout Tied to Taliban
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Kabul’s wells run dry, driving children out of class and into water queues

October 1, 2025

By

Reuters

  • Families in the Afghan capital queue for hours for water
  • Experts warn Kabul groundwater will be exhausted by 2030
  • Tanker costs drain poor households’ income
  • Wells run dry, some 120 metres deep
KABUL, Sept 30 (Reuters) – Eight-year-old Noorullah and his twin, Sanaullah, spend their days hauling yellow jerrycans on a wheelbarrow through Kabul’s dusty alleys instead of going to school – an ordeal for one family that reflects Afghanistan’s deepening water crisis.
Once supplied with water from their own well, the family of 13 has had to queue at communal taps or pool money for costly water tankers since their supply dried up four years ago.

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With climate change increasing the frequency of droughts and erratic rainfall in Afghanistan, aid agencies say Kabul is among the most water-stressed cities in Asia, with shortages fuelling disease, malnutrition and school dropouts.
The Afghanistan Analysts Network, an independent Kabul-based research group, in a report this month warned the city’s groundwater could run out by 2030, with other Afghan cities also running dry. The crisis is deepening inequality, as poor families spend up to 30% of their income on tanker water while the wealthy dig ever-deeper private wells.
STANDING IN LINE FOR HOURS
Noorullah, who has epilepsy, said he once collapsed with a seizure while fetching water. His brother added, “Sometimes we stand in line for three hours. When the heat is too much, we feel dizzy.”
Their father, 42-year-old shopkeeper Assadullah, feels there is no choice. Sitting outside his small shop with empty water barrels stacked nearby, he said, “From morning until evening, my children go for water six or seven times a day.”
“Sometimes they cry and say they cannot fetch more, but what else can we do?”
The shortages have gutted his income too. On a good day, he earns $2–$3, however, he often closes the shop to help his sons push their loads.
“Before, we used to receive water through a company. It lasted us three or four days. Now even that option is gone,” he said.
In the family’s yard, his wife, Speray, washes dishes in a plastic basin, measuring out each jug. She said her husband has developed a stomach ulcer and she contracted H. pylori, a bacterial infection linked to unsafe water. “I boil water twice before giving it to our children, but it is still a struggle,” she said.

SNOWMELT ONCE REPLENISHED KABUL’S WATER BASIN

Kabul’s population has surged past six million in two decades, but investment in water infrastructure has lagged. War wrecked much of the supply network, leaving residents dependent on wells or costly tankers, and those are failing.
Just a few streets from Assadullah, 52-year-old community representative Mohammad Asif Ayubi said more than 380 households in the neighbourhood faced the same plight. “Even wells 120 metres (nearly 400 feet) deep have dried up,” he said, a depth once considered certain to reach water.
Droughts and erratic rainfall patterns have limited the snowmelt that once replenished Kabul’s water basin and left the riverbed dry for much of the year. “Kabul is among the most water-stressed areas,” said Najibullah Sadid, a water researcher based in Germany.
U.N. envoy Roza Otunbayeva warned the U.N. Security Council earier this month that droughts, climate shocks and migration risk turning Kabul into the first modern capital to run out of water “within years, not decades”.
For Assadullah, the wish is simple. “If we had enough water, my children wouldn’t have to run around all day,” he said. “They could go to school. Our whole life would change.”

Reporting by Mohammed Yunus Yawar and in Kabul; additional reporting and writing by Ariba Shahid in Karachi; Editing by Ros Russell

Kabul’s wells run dry, driving children out of class and into water queues
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New documentary scrutinizes the lies that fueled the war in Afghanistan

September 29, 2025

By

The Washington Post

A scene from “Bodyguard of Lies,” which chronicles years of U.S. failure in the Afghanistan conflict. (CBS/Paramount+)

“Bodyguard of Lies,” a documentary examining the deceit that drove the longest war in American history, takes its title from a Winston Churchill line: “In wartime, truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies.”

It’s difficult to say whether truth was considered precious, during the decades that the United States was mired in military conflict in Afghanistan. As the film demonstrates, it was certainly in short supply.

The film adapts a 2019 investigation in The Washington Post, “The Afghanistan Papers,” which uncovered hundreds of firsthand accounts from generals, diplomats and other government officials about what went wrong in the conflict. In their reporting, The Post’s Craig Whitlock, Leslie Shapiro and Armand Emamdjomeh found that those unvarnished remarks often directly contradicted statements made by those same leaders to the American public — adding up to decades of deliberate deception. (Whitlock was also executive producer on the film and appears in it.)

In the movie, director Dan Krauss draws on the revelations from that cache of documents, interviewing a number of people involved in the conflict, including John F. Sopko, special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction; Gen. David McKiernan, the four-star general fired during the Obama administration; and Maj. Gen. Edward M. Reeder, who commanded the U.S. Army Special Forces for much of the war.

Krauss and I spoke over Zoom a few days after the documentary’s Sept. 23 streaming premiere. Our conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

I mostly ran into a lack of interest, to be honest. I think even before the war was over, the American public had really tuned out. Now — what is it, four years after the war has ended? — Afghanistan feels really distant in the minds of the American public. It feels like a lifetime ago, to many.

Can you tell me about how you identified and recruited some of the on-camera interview subjects? Especially when it came to senior military officials, I was curious about why you chose the people you did — and whether there were people you wanted to get but couldn’t.

I said early on to the team, it’s not about the war, it’s about words. There’s been so much terrific landmark reporting about the war itself, and I didn’t want to repeat the work that had come before us. I wanted to keep a very tight focus on the lies — on the differences between what the American public was being told and what those same officials knew to be true behind closed doors.

So who do you recruit to tell that story? There are some obvious players, the big-hat, brand-name players that we could’ve tried to get. It didn’t seem to me that we would learn anything new by putting them in front of the camera again. So I was really focused on handing the microphone to people who hadn’t already spoken at length on this subject — and also people who could speak most directly, and most honestly, to their own role in propagating this rosy picture of the progress being made in Afghanistan.

For my money, General David McKiernan, the four-star general who was fired, is really the hero of the film. He’s deeply introspective and honest about his own experience. He said he’s seen it twice now and each time he’s been very bothered — I think he said troubled — by the film. He was one of the only people who spoke up and said the solution to Afghanistan was going to be a political solution, not a military solution. But there were times, as you saw in the film, whereas he said — you don’t lie, but you maybe don’t say as much as you could, about how difficult the road ahead is going to be. He has a certain amount of regret, I think, for doing that. He acknowledges a certain degree of complicity.
Retired Gen. David McKiernan in “Bodyguard of Lies.” (Jigsaw Productions/Paramount+)

The documentary grew out of the revelations of the Afghanistan Papers, which were published in late 2019. Do you think their publication significantly changed the way the war was conducted?

I have no idea. I mean, I have to — I would like to think that kind of reporting would have an impact. I can’t think of Craig’s reporting without thinking about the Pentagon Papers and Daniel Ellsberg and the Vietnam War. The lies that were told during that war are very like the ones we were being told during this one.

The heart of the film is, as you say, words and deception from the government. Do you think the American public believed the deception?

Certainly, in my neck of the woods and maybe yours, too, I don’t think anyone ever believed that the war was going as well as they were telling us. I don’t know that the sales pitch was really thoroughly effective, at least for people who had a critical eye.

But it’s one thing to sense that, and it’s another thing to read it or to hear it. And that’s what the Afghanistan Papers did, at least for me. … Craig asks in the film, how do you prove that someone’s not telling the truth? Well, in the case of his reporting, you get the receipts.

Right, and then how do you prove that the person isn’t just self-deluded, but is actively telling you something they know to be untrue?

There was a certain degree of self-delusion that went into the lies, and there was also this very American brand of can-do optimism — that if you say something out loud, you will it into being. We are going to win. We are going to create a democracy in Afghanistan. You have to say it out loud in order for it to happen — and if you say it out loud then it puts an enormous amount of pressure and responsibility on the people beneath you.

A scene from “Bodyguard of Lies.” (Danfung Dennis/Paramount+)

By that token, do you think the Biden administration deserves more credit for, in some sense, dispensing with these illusions? The U.S. withdrew from Afghanistan within his first year in office, at some political cost.

I don’t know. I think what’s not discussed, and what I felt was important to include in the film. is the fact that the Trump administration negotiated an agreement with the Taliban, essentially in secret, without input from the U.S. Congress or the Afghan government. Biden inherited that agreement. So there’s certainly a legitimate debate to be had about whether the withdrawal was accomplished as effectively as it would’ve been under another government — who’s to say? Certainly there are strong feelings on all sides of that. But what’s not acknowledged as much is the agreement that led to that withdrawal.

I ask because while watching this documentary, I imagined some theoretical young person who might be getting their first real education about the war. They learn about the lies that got us into, and prolonged, this conflict — then all of a sudden it’s over, and that’s also a calamity. But at some point there must have been a pivot. Some leaders, somewhere — during either the Trump or Biden administrations — took a different course of action and dropped the illusion that we should stay in Afghanistan.

The war ended so disastrously that giving credit to anybody seems really daunting. It’s less about giving credit than reminding people how the end of the war came about: that it was not Biden deciding on his own, unilaterally, to end the war, and it was not Trump actually going through the difficult task of logistically pulling our military out of the country, which is a very, very difficult and dangerous thing to do.

At one point, John F. Sopko, the special inspector general for Afghanistan, almost lays down a gauntlet for the viewer: We should learn our lesson, so we don’t screw up if some president someday promises us a splendid little war. Do you think there are also lessons specifically for the American press corps, especially as they navigate a much more hostile environment? To cite just one example, the Pentagon recently demanded that journalists pledge not to obtain any unauthorized information.

I remember when we bombed the nuclear facilities in Iran and reporters were asking questions about the effectiveness of those strikes — very fair questions, given that American service members were put at risk, and taxpayer dollars and political capital were expended. But there was this sense in the briefing room at the Pentagon that it was unpatriotic to ask questions about the effectiveness of that military strike.

That was one example; the pledge is another. When I see the briefing room at the Pentagon now, I don’t think we’ve learned any lessons, and that things have gotten, in fact, much worse.

The American public has a right to know what’s being done in their name. The idea that it’s unpatriotic to demand answers from our political and military leadership — that’s really scary.

Sophia Nguyen is the news and features writer for the Books section at The Washington Post. She previously served as assistant editor on the National Politics desk and as an assistant editor for Outlook.

New documentary scrutinizes the lies that fueled the war in Afghanistan
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Is maternal mortality on the rise in Afghanistan? No official data, but much cause for concern

September 28, 2025

Jelena Bjelica • AAN Team

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Afghanistan’s maternal mortality rate was already among the ten highest in the world, but it has come under further pressure. The United States’ decision to entirely cut aid to Afghanistan earlier this year has led to the closure of over 400 health facilities and that is likely to have particularly affected women during the most precarious events in their lives — pregnancy and childbirth. Coupled with that, there is a shortage of female doctors and midwives, likely to worsen as midwifery and female nurses’ training are now banned, along with all higher education for girls, including as doctors. Jelena Bjelica and AAN’s team have been trying to get a clearer sense of Afghanistan’s maternal mortality rate. They found quantitative data was scarce, but midwives, doctors and health officials in different provinces said they think the rate is increasing. They also heard from one Afghan who described how his family lost a female family member in childbirth due to poor healthcare. 
It was nine o’clock in the morning when we took her to the clinic in our village. It was her fourth pregnancy. Her husband is my relative. He doesn’t have a car, so he called me to come to his house and help him take her to the clinic. … When we got there, the midwife was present. My relative’s wife went into labour, but the baby was stillborn. The midwife told us to wait a while for her to check my relative’s wife. … 

When she finally gave us permission to leave, the women in our group noticed that my relative’s wife was still bleeding. We asked the midwife if we should take her to the Bost Hospital in Lashkargah city. The midwife said there wasn’t a problem, that it was normal to bleed after childbirth. … After we got her home, the bleeding increased. By the late afternoon, she grew weaker. We finally took her to Bost Hospital, but the doctor told us she had already lost a lot of blood and that the midwife couldn’t have been properly trained because the placenta had not been entirely removed. The doctor said we had got her to hospital too late. We donated blood, but on the third day, late in the afternoon, she passed away in the hospital. 

This incident occurred in Marja district of Helmand province in June 2025.

In an earlier AAN report on rural women’s access to health (published in March 2025, based on 22 interviews conducted in 19 provinces between September and November 2024), we found that the picture was already bleak: women spoke about the prohibitive cost of travel, when household incomes had fallen, the difficulty of independent travel following Emirate restrictions and declining standards in the facilities themselves. For this report, we wanted to really scrutinise the situation of pregnant women and those who have recently delivered and, in particular, try to get a clearer picture about the current maternal mortality rate in Afghanistan. We interviewed nine Afghan health professionals or health officials from eight provinces – Takhar, Jawzjan, Samangan, Balkh, Badghis, Paktika, Zabul and Kabul – as well as one international health expert, regarding the state of maternity care in the country. They also discussed the underlying causes for the apparent rise in maternal mortality, mentioning a decline in foreign support to health care, shortages of medicine, worsening poverty and Emirate restrictions on women’s professional medical training.

What is maternal mortality?

Maternal mortality, also known as maternal death, is defined as when a woman dies due to complications during pregnancy or childbirth or within six weeks of the end of her pregnancy, from any cause related to or aggravated by the pregnancy or its management (WHO). The most significant causes of maternal mortality are: severe bleeding, infections, pre-eclampsia and eclampsia, delivery complications and unsafe abortions.

The rate of maternal mortality is measured as the number of maternal deaths per 100,000 live births. Afghanistan saw a huge reduction in maternal mortality between 2000 and 2023, from 1,372 to 521 deaths per 100,000 live births (World Bank).[1] However, to give a sense of just how high even the 2023 figure is by global standards, some other countries’ rates are: Pakistan 155 deaths of mothers per 100,000 live births; Bangladesh 115; India 80; Uzbekistan 26; US 17; Iran 16; Tajikistan 14; France 7; Norway 1.

There have been no recent surveys on maternal mortality. A government official with the Ministry of Public Health, who wished to remain anonymous, told AAN that due to the US cutting all aid, a health survey had not been completed. He said the whole-country survey had been indirectly funded by USAID and added that 85 per cent of the survey had been finished when Trump issued his order to stop aid. Some of the healthcare professionals we spoke to also pointed to the lack of data, but all thought maternal mortality was rising.

One tiny statistical indication of an increase in the rate came from Deputy Representative of the World Health Organisation (WHO) for Afghanistan, Makta Sharma, who told Salam Watandar on 7 April 2025 that there were currently 620 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births. If correct, that is much higher than the 2023 rate of 521 deaths per 100,000. Apart from that one figure, one is left to anecdotal evidence, which, however, all points to maternal mortality being on the increase. One forecast, from the leading UN agency for sexual and reproductive health, the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), was also stark. The closure of health facilities caused by the end of US funding, it said in February 2025, would “likely result in 1,200 additional maternal deaths and 109,000 additional unintended pregnancies” between 2025 and 2028 (UN News).

Maternal health in the provinces: eyewitness accounts

Our interviewees all agreed that the deterioration in the healthcare system in their provinces was driving an increase in maternal mortality. The medical professionals cited several reasons for that deterioration, with the most prominent being the shortage of professional staff and the lack of health facilities in remote areas of the country due to funding shortfalls. Some also spoke about poverty making it impossible for families to pay for medicine or even getting transport for a woman in difficult labour to the nearest clinic. Poverty also means women are weak or malnourished during pregnancy or have to engage in hard labour during it, both factors adding to the risk of maternal death. The dire economic outlook in Afghanistan since 2021 is part of the story of increasing maternal mortality.[2] Some of our interviewees also drove home how dire they believed the situation had become by relaying instances of women dying in childbirth.

In Takhar province, the head midwife of a clinic said that many pregnant women were dying due to a lack of prenatal and postnatal care, because there were no facilities providing these services, or there was a shortage of medicine, money for transport, or the means to pay staff. Healthcare facilities had closed, she said, and a significant number of midwives and doctors had left Afghanistan.

Women continue to die from high blood pressure, heavy blood loss, and lack of medical attention. One of my close friends gave birth in a hospital. She was discharged too soon due to the overwhelming pressure on doctors and staff. They couldn’t attend to her after delivery, so as soon as she delivered, she was discharged. On the way home, she started bleeding heavily. She was brought to our clinic from the provincial hospital, but despite our best efforts, we couldn’t save her. She died from a heart attack due to the massive blood loss, leaving behind three children. She died and left three children. She was my close friend.

Such deaths were preventable, she said and should have been avoided.

Tragically, half of the women die on the way to hospital or to a clinic. Staff shortages exacerbate the situation. For example, a healthcare worker may see up to 300 patients in a single day and will just not have the capacity to see the 301st patient. It makes it impossible to treat the patients properly. I’ve also seen patients die because they could not afford medicine or get blood.

The head midwife also said that amr bil-maruf officials, tasked with enforcing the law promoting virtue and preventing vice, sometimes make the situation worse. “They sometimes enter delivery rooms during labour, forcing us to leave while they ‘inspect’ the room, claiming we might be hiding our corruption,” she said. “On one occasion, they were physically present in the delivery room when we were actually delivering the baby.”

Another midwife, also in Takhar, said she had left her hospital job after the fall of the Republic because of declining standards in hygiene and management, as many of her colleagues had left the country and others had lost their jobs. However, she said former colleagues told her things had got even worse this year:

The closure of the institutes that trained girls to become midwives and the cut in aid following Trump’s order has severely affected health service delivery. The Taliban have employed their relatives and other people they know. Most of the midwives in the hospital where I used to work are those acquainted with the Taliban. However, they haven’t yet graduated, nor completed their training and education as midwives. There’s been an increase not only in maternal mortality rate but also in children’s mortality rate because of the lack of qualified doctors, nurses and midwives over the past three to four years. 

Another midwife, this time from Jawzjan, who lost her job after the takeover, echoed these points. Her old colleagues had described to her a severe shortage of midwives and doctors, as well as of medicine and medical supplies in clinics. She said the difficulties in healthcare had reached a new high, and that all the problems were contributing to an increase in “the number of maternal deaths and the loss of infants and prematurely born babies.” She recounted a maternal death she had recently witnessed and explained the reasons behind such deaths:

Just a few days ago, I witnessed a death myself while I was in the hospital with a family member of mine who was giving birth. I saw a pregnant woman die during delivery. Also, another woman was in desperate need of a blood transfusion, and her family struggled in vain to find the right blood type for her. Without blood, she too was at risk of losing her life. … These deaths occur because mothers do not receive proper care during pregnancy. Many suffer from malnutrition, anaemia and weakness due to poverty and lack of resources. Without prenatal care, adequate nutrition and medical guidance, both mothers and their babies face risks. Even if the mother survives, newborns often do not. I’ve personally seen babies born prematurely at six months, and doctors explained this was due to the mother’s lack of prenatal care and the heavy physical labour they have to do in the villages. There are no instructions for these women in rural areas on prenatal care.

In Samangan province, a gynaecologist said that maternal and child healthcare in provincial centres had already begun to deteriorate after the fall of the Islamic Republic because many health workers left their posts, and the morale of those who remained plummeted because salaries were significantly lower than before the takeover. But now, she said, after the closure of midwifery schools and the end of USAID funding, “the health services women rely on are crumbling.” She pointed to cases of women dying of complications during delivery, including excessive bleeding. “Due to a shortage of staff and low salaries,” she said, “the quality of health services at provincial health centres just isn’t good.”

A graduate midwife from Balkh province said that women in her province, particularly pregnant women, must often travel long distances to the city for treatment because of the lack of services in remote areas. “Many women have lost their lives because of this,” she said. She believes the closure of midwifery programmes has directly contributed to an increase in the maternal mortality rate in the rural areas of Balkh.

A recent report on maternal mortality in Badakhshan province by the BBC’s Yogita Limaye heard multiple concerns at the provincial hospital there. The budget had been cut by almost two-thirds, 300 patients were being treated in a hospital with 120 beds, and maternal mortality had gone up: by August 2025, she reported, “there had been as many maternal deaths recorded [in the provincial hospital] as there were for the whole of last year.” At that rate, “maternal mortality could increase by as much as 50% [compared to] last year.” Deaths of newborn babies were also up by a third. The hospital’s head midwife, Razia Hanifi, was exhausted. “I have been working for the past 20 years,” she said, “This year is the toughest, because of the overcrowding, the shortage of resources and the shortage of trained staff.”

In Zabul, a local health official said maternal mortality had definitely increased in his province. He said they had only recently begun recording maternal mortality data, so could provide no statistics, but his strong sense was that considerably more women were now dying in pregnancy or childbirth. He gave some recent examples of deaths:

Two weeks ago, we received information about two maternal deaths in a remote village. Neither patient’s family had the money to take the pregnant woman to the hospital, nor was there an ambulance in the area. We also received news of another complicated case in the same district. In that case, we sought help from UNICEF; they arranged for an ambulance, but unfortunately, the area was very remote and, by the time the ambulance arrived, the mother had lost her life.

The problem with access to maternal health care in remote areas was also mentioned by an international health expert, Dr Kweku Ackom, who works with the UK’s foreign and development ministry, who said their implementing partners were relaying anecdotal accounts about women dying at home in hard-to-reach areas. However, as with the Afghan health officials we spoke to, he said there was no systematic data to give a clear idea of the extent of the problem.

A health official in Badghis also mentioned the lack of data. The situation in his province, he said, had anyway been dire. He was aware of the maternal deaths in areas where health facilities did exist, but also said there were large parts of Badghis with no health services at all. People living there were poor and unable to take their women to distant hospitals. “God knows how many pregnant women die there,” he said.

The issue of underreported maternal mortality was also raised by a health official in Paktika province, although for a different reason.

Maternal mortality is more than twice the reported figure. It has definitely increased significantly. The NGOs implementing health projects in my province are not providing accurate data because they attempt to portray their efforts and services as highly successful.

The head midwife from Takhar also said that in her hospital, maternal deaths were underreported to avoid raising questions:

Maternal mortality rates are extremely high; officially, [in my clinic] three out of every 100 patients die, but the real number is far higher. Many deaths are not reported at all; deaths at home or on the way are not reported at all. And even hospital deaths, the ones that are registered, are sometimes hidden or incorrectly recorded to avoid raising questions.

The response of the Islamic Emirate

Although the evidence of a rise in maternal mortality is anecdotal, it strongly suggests that all the reasons for pessimism are correct. The Afghan government, however, wants to tell a different story, shown in its response to comments made by UNFPA’s Deputy Executive Director, Andrew Saberton, who visited Afghanistan in May. He spoke about the funding cuts and the end of the ‘pipeline’ for new midwives, given the ban on midwifery training and on girls’ education beyond 6th grade. He also said that every two hours, an Afghan mother died “from preventable pregnancy and childbirth complications” (Tolo News).

That statistic, said spokesperson for the Ministry of Public Health Sharafat Zaman Amarkhel, was “unfair, unrealistic and incorrect.” He insisted that since regaining power, the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (IEA) had paid special attention tothe health of children and mothers. “Our request to all international organizations,” he said, “is that if they want to publish figures, they should do so in coordination with the Ministry of Public Health to prevent the spread of fear and misinformation among the public” (Tolo News).

Despite the government’s apparent attempt to control the narrative on maternal mortality, our interviews show why the rate is likely going up. In the following sections, we give a little more background on three of the causes mentioned: cuts in aid; scarcities of medicine and the end of midwifery training.

The reduction in aid and access to healthcare 

The difficulties facing pregnant women can be placed in the context of a wider problem with healthcare. At its peak in the late 2010s, Afghanistan’s health system consisted of more than 3,000 health facilities.[3] By 2024, this figure had been reduced by half, with just over 1,500 still operational. As a direct result of the end of US aid, said the WHO Health Cluster Bulletin, by July 2025, the number of health facilities had fallen even further, to 817. Only 297 of the approximately 400 districts in Afghanistan’s 34 provinces now have health facilities.

The funding situation is stark. The United States was the largest single donor to Afghanistan, providing 40 per cent of all aid in 2024. It cut all of it, suddenly and with no, or almost no, warning (for more detail on this, see AAN’s May 2025 report, The End of US Aid to Afghanistan: What will it mean for families, services and the economy?). Healthcare was particularly vulnerable, as it was very dependent on foreign financial support. This reliance was crucial during the Republic era, and nothing changed after the Emirate came to power. Although foreign aid to the health sector declined significantly, the new government allocated a minimal budget to it, prioritising other sectors, especially security.[4] Already, in relation to the much smaller decline in aid seen in 2024, ie before the US completely stopped aid, the World Bank had concluded, in its April 2025 Development Update, that the reduction in aid posed “a serious risk to the continuity of essential service delivery programs, particularly those implemented through the UN and funded via humanitarian channels.” It explained:

Key sectors such as healthcare, education, and social protection which have historically relied on international aid, may face severe disruptions, disproportionately affecting marginalized populations, including women, children, and displaced communities. The contraction in aid may also limit emergency response capabilities, further straining public services and slowing economic recovery efforts.

The decline in general healthcare provision is evident in the quantitative data. The March 2025 Humanitarian Needs Survey[5] assessed the ‘health needs conditions’ in Afghanistan’s 401 districts, and classified as conditions in 373 were severe (234 districts), extreme (134), or catastrophic (5). Just 28 districts in the whole of Afghanistan were classified as being in the ‘better’ categories, in a ‘stress phase’ or with ‘none to minimal health needs’. The assessment was based on: whether households had access to adequate healthcare; the availability of a health centre providing maternity services; and the average time it takes to reach the nearest functional health facility.

The Humanitarian Situation Monitoring, also published in March 2025 by the same group, which assessed 12,015 settlements across 401 districts and 34 provinces, found that residents in 10 per cent of them had no health facility at their disposal, 45 per cent reported that their medical facilities were not adequately staffed, 78 per cent said their medical facilities lacked medicine or equipment, while 28 per cent reported physical difficulties in accessing health services due to damaged roads, no transportation, flooding etc. On the national level, 13 per cent of respondents said the majority of households in their settlement currently had no access to adequate healthcare when they needed it. The worst-affected provinces were Ghor (where a majority of households in 52 per cent of settlements had no access to adequate healthcare), Takhar (37 per cent) and Kunduz (28 per cent). Additionally, the report found that 16 per cent of healthcare facilities were structurally damaged.

The Humanitarian Situation Monitoring also found that women and girls faced particular restrictions limiting their access to healthcare, with 49 per cent of their sample reporting that women were allowed access only when accompanied by a male relative,  or a female relative or friend. In December 2021, the Emirate forbade women from travelling long distances (72 kilometres) without a mahram (a close male relative). However, Emirate officials often interpret this as meaning that women need a mahram whenever they leave the house.[6]

Particularly important for expectant mothers have been the cuts to the UNFPA-run Family Health Houses (FHH),[7] which provide reproductive, maternal, neonatal, child and adolescent health services in the country’s remotest areas. In 2025, the UNFPA lost approximately USD 330 million in US funding worldwide, of which about a third, or USD 102 million, directly affected its work in Afghanistan (UN News). In 2024, UNFPA had supported 533 midwife-led Family Health Houses, serving about four million people, almost 80 per cent of them women, in the most remote areas of 26 provinces (UNFPA).[8] It was also running 263 mobile health teams and 28 clinics and health centres. The UNFPA said in a tweet on 21 May 2025 that, because of the funding cuts, more than six million people were losing access to “essential health care, most of them women and girls, including lifesaving maternal health services” and that “hundreds of health centres operating in remote areas and mobile clinics are being forced to close.” The number of midwives that UNFPA is able to support in 2025 has also almost halved. Instead of the 974 midwives that the agency planned to support this year, it will be able to pay for only 565 (UNFPA).

Some midwives and doctors, such as the gynaecologist from Samangan whom we interviewed, have agreed to continue working for free. She told us that after USAID pulled its funding, UNFPA asked if she would volunteer and work without pay for several months.

I work in Hazrat-e Sultan, a very poor area where people have nothing. How could we abandon them? So, we agreed. We also knew we weren’t the only ones; colleagues across Samangan’s remote districts made the same choice, working unpaid because the need was so urgent. 

The scarcity of medicine

Medication shortages have also gripped the current healthcare system in Afghanistan. With the decline of aid, medicines needed by health facilities in Afghanistan, including for women during childbirth, have also become scarcer, our interviewees reported. “The number of patients is overwhelming, yet resources and medicines are scarce,” the head midwife from Takhar province said:

Supplies intended to last three months often run out in just a month, leaving facilities empty-handed for the next two months. There has been a significant cut in funds and supplies are no longer as plentiful as before, which means a shortage of personnel, medicine and ambulances. Previously, I was part of a project that provided folic acid to pregnant women free of charge,[9] but that programme has now been stopped. Pregnant women must now buy everything themselves, but most can’t afford it. The majority of women don’t even have money for medicine or transport. Many walk six to seven hours just to reach a clinic.

The health official in Badghis said there was a critical need for medicines for their patients, including women in labour. He said: “We don’t have enough essential medicines, nor do we have medicines which are needed in an emergency for a mother during her delivery.” The health official in Zabul said they lacked medicines for mothers, both prenatal and postnatal, while a health official in Paktika also reported similar issues regarding medicines for childbirth: “I’m running a health project and I can say that we don’t have any medicines for those who give birth in our clinics.”

One high-ranking health official working in the Ministry of Public Health told AAN that the clinics have some emergency medicines available to provide to mothers before and after delivery. However, he mentioned that the stock of medicines had decreased since the collapse of the Republic. This medicine shortage was also one of the main findings of a qualitative study on the factors hindering access and utilisation of maternal healthcare in Afghanistan, published in the Healthcare journal in April 2025. The study found that:

Medication shortages have also gripped the current healthcare system, especially in the public health sector and rural areas. Public hospitals have also run out of medications quickly because they have more patients than private hospitals. In rural regions, distance and weather conditions hinder access to medication, leaving patients stranded and without essential medications. A provider noted that “In rural areas, when hospitals run out of medicine in the winter… They cannot travel to the city to get them because the snow blocks the road for 6 months or more.”

The end of midwifery training 

The latest trouble putting Afghanistan’s maternal health sector at risk is the IEA’s ban on all midwifery and nursing schools, effective from December 2024 (BBC, UNICEF).[10] This ban, along with the earlier general prohibition on girls’ education beyond the first six grades, and on higher education, including training to become a doctor, will have long-term consequences. This ban is even more serious than it would be in many other countries because of the cultural taboo and legal prohibition on male medical staff attending female patients. Already in 2024, the UNFPA had estimated that Afghanistan urgently needed at least 18,000 additional midwives to meet basic maternal care needs. Without a steady stream of new midwives, the need for medically trained women to help their compatriots in childbirth will never be met. Indeed, the existing shortage in midwives will only worsen. Earlier this year, in March 2025, UNICEF warned that, as a direct consequence of the education bans, the country would experience a shortage of qualified female health workers. “With fewer female doctors and midwives,” it said, “girls and women will not receive the medical treatment and support they need. We are estimating an additional 1,600 maternal deaths and over 3,500 infant deaths [no time span given].”

We interviewed a young woman from a family of midwives in Balkh province, who had just graduated from the midwifery programme when the ban was announced. However, she was unable to obtain her diploma or take the exit exam. This left her unemployable.

A former head of the Afghan Midwives Association, Sabera Turkmani, argued that the midwifery ban had to be lifted, in an opinion piece published in December 2024 in the British Medical Journal:

The health workforce is in a state of crisis, with most healthcare facilities lacking female health providers, leaving many women living in rural and remote areas without access to skilled maternity care. … I have witnessed substantial progress while working with Afghan communities. … Afghan midwives play a pivotal role in advancing primary healthcare and provide a wide range of essential reproductive, maternal, newborn, child, and adolescent health interventions. … Midwifery services are indispensable for saving lives as cultural and religious norms in Afghanistan prohibit male healthcare providers from attending to women. … Skilled midwives can have a central role in reducing maternal and neonatal mortality. Beyond clinical skills, the ripple effects of midwifery are profound. Empowering midwives is not merely a cost-effective health intervention; it is a pathway to economic growth, community resilience, and peacebuilding. 

The system, even as it is now, cannot provide quality healthcare services for mothers. But given that every year, female health professionals retire or leave the service for other reasons, without a steady stream of new female doctors, midwives and nurses, professional childbirth services in Afghanistan will likely not survive.

Looking ahead

It seems no exaggeration to say that Afghanistan’s maternal healthcare system is in crisis, under threat both from a dire shortage of funding and – especially with an eye to the future – the end of the education pipeline to ensure new female nurses, doctors and midwives are coming into the workforce to replace older women retiring or otherwise leaving their jobs. We may not have the exact numbers, but after two decades of fewer Afghan women dying in pregnancy and childbirth, the figures are surely now rising. Becoming a mother in Afghanistan, going through pregnancy and childbirth, was already riskier than in most other countries in the world, even during the relatively well-resourced Republic era. It has now become even more dangerous. As the midwife from Jawzjan put it: “Afghan women are among the most unfortunate in the world. … They lose their lives even while giving birth to new ones.”

Edited by Kate Clark

References

References
↑1 In the same period, the maternal mortality rate worldwide dropped by approximately 40 per cent (WHO).
↑2 Afghanistan’s economy shrank by a quarter after the takeover and while it has recovered somewhat, growth is not keeping pace with population growth. For more on this, see AAN’s The Afghan Economy Since the Taleban Took Power: A dossier of reports on economic calamity, state finances and consequences for households from 14 May 2023, and more recently, Survival and Stagnation: The State of the Afghan economy, 7 November 2023.
↑3 There are two types of health services within the government’s health system: the Basic Health Package of Services for Afghanistan (BPHS) and the Essential Package of Hospital Services (EPHS). The BPHS includes health centres such as District Hospitals (DH), Comprehensive Health Centres (CHCs), Basic Health Centres (BHCs), and Sub-Health Centres (SHCs). The BPHS delivers services in district centres and villages. Additionally, there are some Family Health Housings (FHHs) operating in villages.
↑4 In the World Bank’s October 2023 Development Update, it summarised the priorities of Emirate government expenditure as “utilizing available resources largely to pay for security, teachers’ salaries, and core civil and administrative functions while leaving donors to finance healthcare, food security, broader education needs, and the agri-food system.”

The figures are stark: in 2022, the Emirate spent 60 per cent of its operating expenditure (which takes up almost all of the budget) on the security services – army, police and intelligence – and only 1 per cent on health. See also Kate Clark, Survival and Stagnation: The State of the Afghan economy, AAN, 7 November 2023, for a later look at the Emirate’s spending choices, including on health.
↑5 The Needs Monitoring Framework was developed by a group of humanitarian actors in Afghanistan to assist humanitarian planning. It is designed for quarterly monitoring.
↑6 See Kate Clark, A year of Propagating Virtue and Preventing Vice: Enforcers and ‘enforced’ speak about the Emirate’s morality law, AAN, 21 August 2025.
↑7 The Family Health Houses were established as a cost-effective component of the basic health services package that has been incorporated into the Islamic Emirate’s National Health Policy 2025-2030. The national policy says this about the Family Health Houses/Primary Health Care Centres:

The centers that provide primary health care services are called family health houses will have the capacity to deliver preventive, promotional, treatment, and rehabilitation services based on a designated package of services.

The IEA’s National Health Policy 2025-2030 also says:

3.4. Human Resources:

In the year 2024, the number of doctors, nurses, and midwives per 10,000 people reached 10.3, which is below the proposed global standards for achieving sustainable development goals. The recommended number for international standards is 34.2 healthcare workers per 10,000 people. Additionally, the access to overall healthcare coverage is much lower than the suggested target of 44.5 healthcare workers per 10,000 people. Only 15% of nurses and 2% of doctors are women.

3.5. Health Financing:

In the year 2022, Afghanistan’s total healthcare expenditures amounted to 3.6 billion dollars, or approximately 102 dollars per person per year. Of this, 1% was covered by the government, 21% by foreign aid, and 78% privately spending from the people’s pockets. A significant portion of the people’s private expenditures is being spent on 540 private hospitals, 260 private OPD clinics, and through several private NGOs.

4.1. The Vision of Ministry of Public Health:

All residents of Afghanistan receive quality, affordable, accessible and sustainable health services according to the highest standards inside the country and have a healthy community.
↑8 Vaccination is also integrated into the FHH services to support the prevention of common childhood diseases and maternal infections.
↑9 Folic acid is prescribed for women who are pregnant or trying to conceive as it helps prevent birth defects known as neural tube defects, including spina bifida.
↑10 The last Republic-era acting Minister of Public Health, Wahid Majrooh, who carried on in his post through the takeover, wrote an article in the medical journal, The Lancet, in April 2025, calling for the immediate lifting of the midwifery ban:

The exclusion of Afghan women and girls from medical, midwifery, and nursing education will further limit women’s access to basic health services, erode their agency, deepen gender inequality, and worsen maternal and child health outcomes in Afghanistan. To avoid the reversal of the past two decades’ achievements and ensure the health of mothers and children in Afghanistan, the ban on women and girls’ education, especially in medicine, midwifery, and nursing, must be lifted now.

 

Is maternal mortality on the rise in Afghanistan? No official data, but much cause for concern
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Shehbaz Sharif Urges Inclusive Political Framework for Afghanistan at UNGA

September 28, 2025
Bibi Amina Hakimi
TOLOnews’ Reporter
27 Sept 2025

He added that Pakistan has a direct stake in Afghanistan’s peace and stability, considering it a key to regional prosperity and enhanced economic connectivity.

At the 80th session of the United Nations General Assembly, Shehbaz Sharif, the Prime Minister of Pakistan, once again highlighted Afghanistan as one of the main pillars of Islamabad’s foreign policy.

In his remarks, he stressed that Pakistan seeks the establishment of an inclusive political framework in Afghanistan—a framework which, he believes, can pave the way for internal stability and regional development.

Shehbaz Sharif, Prime Minister of Pakistan, stated: “Pakistan continues to engage with all partners to extend humanitarian assistance, promote economic recovery and encourage inclusive political framework in Afghanistan.”

He added that Pakistan has a direct stake in Afghanistan’s peace and stability, considering it a key to regional prosperity and enhanced economic connectivity.

Sharif also urged the Islamic Emirate to uphold human rights, particularly women’s rights and to take concrete measures against terrorist groups in order to build global confidence.

“The interim Afghan government must however uphold human rights including women’s rights. Above all, we expect that Afghan interim government to take effective action against terrorist groups and to ensure that Afghan soil is not used for terrorism against any country,” he said.

Political analysts say the Prime Minister’s remarks reflect both Pakistan’s security concerns and its efforts to maintain a central role in Afghanistan’s political landscape.

Gul Mohammaduddin Mohammadi, a political analyst, said: “Pakistan’s policy toward Afghanistan is dual. At times, it supports Afghanistan, but at other times, it seeks to undermine it. Pakistan claims, without evidence, that armed groups like the TTP are supported from Afghanistan, while Afghanistan has repeatedly rejected this accusation and asked Pakistan to provide proof.”

Akram Arefi, a university professor, shared his view: “Pakistan’s policy is to keep Afghanistan aligned, as a friendly state standing beside Pakistan in regional politics. However, it now seems there is a certain distance between the Islamic Emirate and Pakistan. Pakistan, by playing the role of mediator, can relatively fulfill this role, as it has close ties with Western countries, particularly the United States.”

This comes after Pakistan’s Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister had earlier said that bilateral relations between the two countries had improved.

Shehbaz Sharif Urges Inclusive Political Framework for Afghanistan at UNGA
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Up to 5,000 Afghans Deported Daily from Iran via Islam Qala Border

September 28, 2025
Nasir Ahmad Salehi
TOLOnews Reporter
28 Sept 2025

According to statistics, up to 5,000 people enter Afghanistan daily through the Islam Qala border crossing from Iran.

Local officials in Herat say that in recent days, the deportation and forced return of Afghan migrants from Iran has once again increased.

According to statistics, up to 5,000 people enter Afghanistan daily through the Islam Qala border crossing from Iran.

Abdul Ghani Kamel, Acting Head of the Committee for Migrant Assistance at the Islam Qala port, said: “These migrants are forced to leave Iran. When they went to Iran, they had no intention of returning, but there they faced coercion. The breadwinner of the family is arrested and deported, forcing the rest of the family to return as well. Even women are detained and deported alone by the Iranian government, which compels other family members to follow them.”

Several deported migrants said that their families remain in Iran, while Iranian police detained and expelled them.

Abdullah, a deported migrant from Iran, said: “Two months ago, our documents were revoked, and my children were expelled from school. Those without documents were denied housing. I worked secretly to provide food, but we were eventually forced to return.”

Mohammad Rafi, another deported migrant, said: “I had lived in Iran for 44 years. I was arrested and deported, but my family remains in Iran. Iranian security forces made false accusations against me, expelled me, and I lost my work and livelihood there.”

Azizullah, a deported migrant, said: “I lived in Iran for 17 years and got married there, but my documents were annulled. My wife had a passport, and I had a census card, but we were still deported.”

According to statistics from local Herat officials, in just over the past three months following the start of Iran’s large-scale deportation of Afghans—more than 1.1 million migrants have entered Afghanistan through the Islam Qala border.

Iranian authorities have warned that a second wave of Afghan migrant deportations will begin soon.

Up to 5,000 Afghans Deported Daily from Iran via Islam Qala Border
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Taliban’s ban on women’s education is extremism, threatens Afghanistan’s future: UN envoy Bennett

September 28, 2025

ANI

The Tribune

North India

 Sep 28, 2025 
featured-img

New York [US], September 28 (ANI): UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in Afghanistan, Richard Bennett, has warned that the Taliban’s ban on women’s education constitutes extremism and threatens the country’s stability, development, and international standing, Tolo News reported.

Speaking on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York on Friday, Bennett said the Taliban’s emphasis on religious indoctrination over formal schooling was depriving Afghanistan’s younger generation of “opportunity and hope.”

He underscored the importance of credible, well-documented reports from Afghanistan, noting that they remain essential for shaping global debate and pushing meaningful international action. “Without such evidence,” he cautioned, “the plight of Afghan women and girls risks being overshadowed.”

According to Tolo News, Bennett also called for the creation of more platforms to allow Afghans themselves to be heard, particularly Islamic scholars and experts. He argued that their voices are critical in countering the Taliban’s narrative.

The UN envoy further highlighted the Taliban’s suppression of civil society, intimidation of critics, and reprisals against dissenters. “Despite attempts to silence opposition, the group’s actions remain under international scrutiny,” he said, as cited by Tolo News.

His remarks come as global human rights organisations continue to press the United Nations and international powers for stronger measures against Taliban restrictions, especially those targeting women and girls.

Bennett’s warning, Tolo News reported, underlines a grim reality for Afghanistan: without access to education and civil freedoms, the country risks long-term instability, deeper isolation from the international community, and the loss of an entire generation’s potential.

This concern was also echoed in a report published by the Atlantic Council on September 17, which stated that since the return of Taliban in 2021, more than one million girls in Afghanistan had been denied access to education, Tolo News reported.

The council further noted that education in Afghanistan had become an act of resistance.

A section of the report read: “Since the return of the Taliban in 2021 and their imposition of a gender apartheid system, more than one million girls in Afghanistan have been pushed out of school. Yet, across villages and cities, they continue to learn, build, and lead–often in silence, and often starting from next to nothing,” Tolo News quoted.

Tafsir Siyahposh, a women’s rights activist, said, “Our demand from the Islamic Emirate is to provide opportunities for women, reopen the doors of schools and universities. We may not have doctors tomorrow, which is extremely important. We may not have teachers. In every field where women are needed today, we might have no one left to step in,” Tolo News quoted.

Meanwhile, a number of female students in the country had once again called for the reopening of schools that had been shut to them.

Rabiya, a student, said, “When I work on a piece of art or paint a picture, I feel hopeful. I tell myself that even if I can’t go to school, at least I’ve managed to reach a certain point. Art is not less valuable than science, but worldly knowledge is necessary for us–we must learn it, because we are the ones who can build the future.”

Maryam, another student, said, “My only wish is that the doors of schools be reopened for us as soon as possible so that we can have a brighter future.”

(This content is sourced from a syndicated feed and is published as received. The Tribune assumes no responsibility or liability for its accuracy, completeness, or content.)

Taliban’s ban on women’s education is extremism, threatens Afghanistan’s future: UN envoy Bennett
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American man detained in Afghanistan has been released

September 28, 2025

By Alireza Hajihosseini and Piper Hudspeth Blackburn

CNN
September 28, 2025

An American man who had been detained in Afghanistan by the Taliban since December 2024 has been released, the US State Department announced Sunday.

Amir Amiry, 36, was released Sunday after months of negotiations led by Qatari and US mediators and is now headed back to the United States, according to the State Department and a diplomatic source with knowledge of the release.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio thanked Qatar in a statement, saying the country’s “strong partnership and tireless diplomatic efforts were vital to securing his release.”

“President Trump will not rest until all our captive citizens are back home,” he added. “This release today is a significant step by the administration in Kabul to effect that goal.”

Amiry is the latest American to have been released through America’s security and diplomatic partnership with Qatar, a Gulf state which the US has enjoyed a strong relationship with for decades. The US does not have a diplomatic presence in Afghanistan, having closed its embassy there after the Taliban takeover in August 2022.

The circumstances of why Amiry was in Afghanistan or why he was detained aren’t clear. CNN has reached out to the State Department.

Hamdullah Fitrat, a deputy spokesman for the Taliban, said in a statement that US hostage envoy Adam Boehler met with Afghanistan Foreign Minister Mawlawi Amir Khan Muttaqi on Sunday. Muttaqi stated in the meeting that Amiry’s release demonstrated “that the Government of Afghanistan does not view issues concerning foreign nationals from a political perspective and reiterated that diplomacy provides pathways for resolving such matters,” Fitrat noted.

Qatari Minister of State Mohammed Al-Khulaifi said in a statement released by the country’s foreign ministry that Qatar “remains committed to advancing mediation efforts aimed at achieving peaceful solutions to conflicts and complex international issues.”

There are at least three other Americans detained in Afghanistan, as well as Paul Overby, who is believed to be deceased, a source familiar told CNN. There is hope that this release will be the first of more to come, the source said. The Taliban didn’t receive anything directly for the release of Amiry, they said.

Ahmad Habibi, the brother of Mahmood Habibi, an American citizen held by the Taliban since August 2022, said he and his family “are grateful to hear that another American has been freed from unjust Taliban captivity.”

“All Americans should be happy for that. But my brother is also an American and he has been held by the Taliban since August 10, 2022, without any acknowledgment or ability to speak with his wife,” he said. “We are grateful that senior officials at the State Department and National Security Council have repeatedly assured us that any deal they do with the Taliban will be ‘all or nothing’ and they have explicitly assured us that they will not leave my brother behind. The Biden Administration did nothing for us. We have faith in President Trump.”

CNN’s Jennifer Hansler, Mohammed Tawfeeq and Masoud Popalzai contributed to this report.

 

American man detained in Afghanistan has been released
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