The Taliban says Afghan citizens were not to blame for Pakistan’s security problems.
Pakistan’s plan to evict hundreds of thousands of Afghan refugees and migrants is “unacceptable”, says the Taliban, denying Islamabad’s allegations that Afghanistan’s citizens were responsible for Pakistan’s security problems.
“The behaviour of Pakistan towards Afghan refugees is unacceptable,” Zabihullah Mujahid, spokesman for the Taliban administration in Kabul, said in a post on the social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter, on Wednesday.
“Afghan refugees are not involved in Pakistan’s security problems. As long as they leave Pakistan voluntarily, that country should tolerate them,” he said.
Around one million Afghans are registered as refugees in Pakistan and 880,000 more have legal status to remain, according to the latest United Nations figures.
But Pakistan’s caretaker government on Tuesday said a further 1.73 million Afghans were living in Pakistan without any legal status, and set a November 1 deadline for them to leave or face expulsion.
In a statement shared with Al Jazeera, rights group Amnesty International on Wednesday urged Pakistan to continue its “historic support” for Afghan refugees by enabling them to live with dignity and free from the fear of deportation to Afghanistan.
“They are living incredibly precarious lives where they are either having to undergo arduous processes for registering as refugees in Pakistan; or are stuck in lengthy processes waiting to obtain relocation to another country. A forced return to Afghanistan could put them at grave risk,” it said.
Amnesty called on the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) to expedite registration and reviews of applications from Afghans seeking international protection in Pakistan and asked Pakistan to stop the crackdown against the refugees.
Tensions between neighbours
Afghans have migrated to neighbouring Pakistan over decades of conflict during the Soviet invasion, the following civil war and the United States-led occupation. Nearly 600,000 Afghans have arrived since the Taliban seized power in Kabul in 2021.
Taliban authorities have been trying to tempt back those who left, despite the nation suffering from a massive scaleback of aid following the collapse of the US-backed government.
To justify its crackdown, Pakistan’s caretaker Interior Minister Sarfraz Bugti alleged that Afghan nationals had carried out 14 out of 24 suicide bombings in Pakistan this year.
The Taliban rejected the charge.
“We deny all these claims because Afghans have migrated to other countries for their safety, their security,” said Abdul Mutalib Haqqani, spokesman for the Afghan Ministry of Refugees and Repatriation.
“It’s natural when someone migrates to another country for his safety, he would never want insecurity there,” he told AFP news agency.
Pakistan’s ultimatum to the migrants, most of whom have been living in the country for years, came after a meeting of civil and military leaders to review the law-and-order situation following two suicide bombings on Friday that killed at least 57 people.
Bugti said one of the suicide bombers was an Afghan national, and he also accused India’s intelligence agency of involvement.
Relations between the Taliban and the Pakistan government have deteriorated markedly, with border clashes temporarily closing the main trade route between the neighbours last month.
Islamabad alleges that armed groups use Afghan soil to train fighters and plan attacks inside Pakistan. The Taliban denies the accusation, saying Pakistan’s security problems are home-grown.
A caretaker government was installed in August to guide Pakistan through to elections expected sometime in the coming months, and the military has been able to exert more influence as a result of the uncertainty and instability in the country.lay Video
SOURCE: AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES
Pakistan’s plan to evict thousands of Afghans ‘unacceptable’, says Taliban
It was three hours to midnight on a hot Virginia evening in early July when Nasrat Ahmadyar returned to the two-bedroom apartment he shared with his wife and four children. He’d just finished a game of volleyball, but the night was not over.
Ahmadyar, 31, was struggling to pay rent, behind on his car payments, and constantly preoccupied with the situation in Afghanistan, the country he’d fled not two years earlier after the Taliban took over. Had he stayed, he was certain he would have been killed because of the years he spent helping American special forces in their long and ultimately fruitless campaign to stop the hardline Islamist movement from returning to power.
He settled in Alexandria, Virginia, across the Potomac River from Washington DC, and like many Afghans got into rideshare driving, after saving up for a down payment on a Toyota Highlander SUV. Friends who’d been in the country for a while warned him that though the suicide bombings and assassinations the Taliban were known for did not happen in the US, other perils existed.
Nasrat Ahmadyar in Washington. Photograph: Courtesy Mateen Rahmati
“I told him, like: ‘Dude, Uber and Lyft is not safe in America,’” recalls Mohammad Ahmadi, a cousin and former interpreter for the US military in Afghanistan who is now a truck driver in Texas. But Ahmadyar shrugged off his concern. If anyone wanted his car, they could have it, he said; insurance would buy him another. “But I said: ‘People do not understand a lot of things, they are on drugs, they are on alcohol, they’re gonna shoot [you].’”
Back at the apartment, Ahmadyar informed his wife, Mezhgan Ahmadyar, that he had to get to work.
“Aren’t you tired of those late nights?” Mezhgan asked. “Don’t go.” But Nasrat was insistent. “Bye,” he said as he headed out the door. Then, unusually, he stuck his head back into the apartment to tell his family: “Be careful. Take care of each other.”
Hours later, Mezhgan was awakened by a knock on her door, and opened it to find two police officers. The police told her Ahmadyar had been shot to death in Washington DC. His murder remains unsolved.
Using interviews with his relatives, friends and former colleagues, the Guardian put together the story of Nasrat Ahmadyar’s life in Afghanistan and his escape to a country where they believed he would be safe, only to fall victim to its epidemic of gun violence.
When American forces swept into Afghanistan in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, one of their first priorities was securing Bagram airfield, a Soviet-constructed facility that soon became crucial to the US-led war effort in the country. It was located next to a village called Gholam Ali, where Ahmadyar grew up. He was still a child when the Americans arrived and was raised in the riverside village during a time of civil war between the Taliban and militias who opposed it.
While the Taliban transformed into an insurgency in the countryside, the Americans built up Bagram into a major base, where warplanes would fly out on missions, presidents would fly in on visits and the CIA would, for several years, torture prisoners. Looking for work in Afghanistan’s war-ravaged economy, Ahmadyar began helping with construction projects on the base, learning English from the soldiers around him.
In the years that followed, he became a fixture for the army special forces, also known as green berets, who rotated in and out of Bagram. They called him “Nas” and relied on his fluency in Pashto and Dari. He, in turn, became an enthusiast of the American culture he learned from the military, recalls Matt Butler, a special forces company commander who arrived in Afghanistan in 2009.
“He literally grew up being raised by green berets, if you can imagine that,” Butler said. “He watched American movies, listened to our music – hell, he was even buying protein powder and going to the gym and getting huge.”
Butler and Ahmadyar formed a unique bond. “He was just slightly older than my oldest child,” Butler said. “I was closer to him than … any of the other interpreters I worked with.”
Around that time, Ahmadyar married Mezhgan in a joint ceremony held alongside an older brother and his fiancee. The newlyweds were cousins who grew up in the same village and were engaged after realizing each had their eye on the other.
Mezhgan knew Nasrat sometimes accompanied the soldiers on missions where they’d come under fire from the Taliban. “It’s kind of dangerous. I just want to let you know,” he would say, but he would also tell her not to worry too much – these were well-equipped American soldiers.
In the years that followed, other Afghans Ahmadyar knew applied for special immigrant visas (SIV) that allowed them to move to the United States, but he decided to stay, even though he would receive threats from the Taliban. Eventually, he changed his mind and sought out Butler’s help for a visa.
His application was still in process when American troops withdrew, the then president Ashraf Ghani’s government collapsed and the Taliban took over Kabul in August 2021. As western nations carried out a last-ditch air evacuation from the capital’s airport for their citizens and allies who now risked retaliation from the Taliban, Ahmadyar tried and failed to get his family on to a plane. When that proved unsuccessful, he was connected with Jeramie Malone, a volunteer in the United States who was working with groups attempting to get former translators and others out of the country.
Communicating over messaging apps, they plotted a way for him to catch a charter flight. Ahmadyar, in turn, helped provide Malone with information that she used to help other at-risk Afghans get out.
“He gave me a lot of information that allowed us to either direct people towards or direct people away from locations and travel routes,” Malone said. Though they’d never met, Malone built up a rapport with Ahmadyar as he bundled his family into a car and headed north from the capital.
Lanky and more than 6ft tall, Ahmadyar often stood out in a crowd, and with the Taliban in possession of biometric data collected by the US military and former Afghan government that would have betrayed his collaboration with them, he told Malone of the terror he felt at the chance of being identified at a checkpoint.
“I don’t want to be murdered in front of my children,” Malone remembers him saying.
Eventually, the family took a flight from the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif to the United Arab Emirates, where Ahmadyar’s fourth child, Ali, was born. They waited months for their visa to be processed, eventually arriving in the United States in April 2022.
Under the SIV program, the United States has admitted more than 114,000 Afghans who faced retaliation for their work with the military, according to the state department. This year, the advocacy group the Association of Wartime Allies estimated that more than 360,000 SIV applicants were awaiting processing, but that at the pace the government was moving, it would take 31 years to resolve their cases.
Upon arriving in the United States, a resettlement agency found Ahmadyar’s family a place to live in Philadelphia, and he was reunited with Rahim Amini, a friend from Afghanistan who had also worked with the US military and immigrated to the United States a year prior. From Pennsylvania, he would commute to northern Virginia to drive a tow truck with Amini, before returning to his family in Philadelphia. But he did not feel welcome in his new surroundings.
One time, as he was walking to pick up groceries in the city, a man stopped him and accused him of being an undercover cop, Amini said. Two other times, teenagers tried to rob him on the street. It got bad enough that a neighbor offered to escort him whenever he would leave his apartment.
Ahmadyar and Rahim Amini in an undated photo. Photograph: Courtesy Rahim Amini
“It was very difficult … for Nasrat to take a break to go home because he was driving three hours, sometimes four hours to go visit the family, then come back, and his children were not of the age that they can solve their problems,” Amini said. “And he was not safe in Pennsylvania.”
By November 2022, he had relocated to Alexandria, but a few months later, he quit the tow truck company after a dispute with management and started driving for Lyft. Rideshare and delivery companies are common employers for newly arrived Afghans, said Janis Shinwari, co-founder of No One Left Behind, a group that supports SIV recipients.
But such jobs aren’t without risk. Shinwari has heard of Afghan drivers who have been robbed, had their cars stolen, or had intoxicated passengers trash their vehicles, and end up deciding to find other work.
“They think that when once they come to the United States that they will be safe here. But once they come here and see these [incidents], they think: ‘That’s not safe,’” Shinwari said.
Amini and Ahmadyar were both concerned about those left behind in Afghanistan. Ahmadyar was particularly worried about his former neighbors in Gholam Ali, his hometown, now caught in the grips of the economic downward spiral Afghanistan has been on ever since western nations cut off aid following the Taliban’s takeover.
The two friends would send whatever money they could spare back to help feed and pay for medical care for people they heard needed help, with Ahmadyar working overtime to afford the charity.
“I worked eight hours for my own, then another four hours for the people,” Amini remembers him saying.
Malone and Ahmadyar finally had a chance to meet after he relocated to Virginia, and they’d trade phone calls and text messages regularly. “Something about Nasrat is he always had time for friends,” she said.
Ahmadyar also had a reputation as trouble on the volleyball court. He’d bedeviled American soldiers in Afghanistan, and even got to challenge professional players flown in by the USO.
On the afternoon of 2 July, Ahmadyar headed for a pickup volleyball game at a park in Alexandria, and brought his sons Asem, eight, and Wahdat, 11, along. He seemed tired that day, Amini recalls, and they called it quits after two matches.
As they parted ways, Ahmadyar told Amini that he planned to do a shift with Lyft because he needed rent money. Amini suggested he wait till tomorrow – there was unlikely to be much work so late on a Sunday night. Ahmadyar appeared to agree, and Amini told him he’d call him early in the morning for the Muslim prayer time.
Amini does not know what made him change his mind, but Ahmadyar did go out that evening, traveling a route that took him to a tree-shaded block of rowhouses and apartments in the Capitol Hill neighborhood.
While the US as a whole saw homicides rise nearly 30% in 2020, as the pandemic began, data indicates many cities have seen a decrease so far this year. But in Washington DC, the murder rate has ticked even higher, with homicides up 37% so far this year compared with 2022, and vehicle thefts up 106%, according to the Metropolitan police.
In footage from surveillance cameras shot just after midnight on 3 July and made public after Ahmadyar’s death, figures can be seen approaching the rear of a car parked on the street with its hazard lights on. A single gunshot is heard, then what appear to be four boys run down an alley beneath the building where the camera is mounted.
“You just killed him,” one of them can be heard saying. “He was reaching, bro,” another replies.
A spokesperson for the police department declined to comment on the investigation. At a community meeting in late July, the local news blog Capitol Hill Corner reported a police lieutenant, Araz Alali, said the investigation into Ahmadyar’s death “is making significant progress and we should be anticipating a closure in that imminently”.
In a statement, Lindsey Appiah, the deputy mayor for public safety, said the city had “far too many people carrying and using illegal guns, and too many people acting without accountability for the terror they’re inflicting on our communities. A safer DC is possible, and our community agrees the status quo is not acceptable.”
Ahmadyar’s death shattered Mezhgan’s life, and the belief she had that she’d finally be safe in the US.
“We never thought we were going to lose one of our family members here. We thought here was different. It’s not Afghanistan,” she said through a translator. “I thought that killing, it’s just in Afghanistan, not in America. But now, I see it’s no different.”
Unable to speak English and suddenly alone with four children, Mezhgan is trying to piece together how to sustain her family. She’s considering moving to California and buying a house, using money from a fundraiser Malone set up on GoFundMe, which has now received more than $500,000. “This should not happen, and it shouldn’t happen to anybody here. But if there was one person that absolutely did not deserve something like this, it was Nasrat,” Malone said.
Ahmadyar’s children, meanwhile, are struggling to adapt to life without their father. “For Nasrat’s family, he was responsible for everything,” said Mateen Rahmati, a cousin of Ahmadyar who is hosting the family in northern California as they decide their next steps.
Rahmati, too, drives for Lyft, but after his cousin’s murder and another friend’s carjacking, he’s hesitant to get behind the wheel at night. He’s also been helping with Ahmadyar’s children, who call him when he’s out driving, asking to take them somewhere to play.
“I take them to the park, playing soccer with them … to keep them happy,” he said.
Five days after Ahmadyar’s death, mourners gathered for his burial at a Muslim cemetery an hour south of his home in Virginia. His family hopes to get a stone headstone for his grave, but for now the site is marked by a piece of paper, where Ahmadyar’s name is written, in English.
He survived Afghanistan under the Taliban. In Washington, he was shot dead
The Foreign Ministry said in a statement that participants will discuss economic, regional and climate issues in the meeting on the 4th and 5th of October.
Acting Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi led a delegation to China to attend the Trans-Himalaya Forum for International Cooperation based on an official invitation from Beijing.
The deputy spokesman for the Foreign Ministry, Zia Ahmad Takal, said on X that Muttaqi will also hold bilateral talks with the Chinese Foreign Minister and representatives of other countries in addition to participating in the meeting.
The Foreign Ministry said in a statement that participants will discuss economic, regional and climate issues in the meeting on the 4th and 5th of October.
“Restoring a better atmosphere of trust between countries of the region and Afghanistan in the diplomatic sphere and resolving some of the concerns which the regional countries have is very important to us. The other agenda of the meeting is related to China. The Islamic Emirate wants to send its message in such meetings and positively use such meetings,” said Zabihullah Mujahid, the Islamic Emirate’s spokesman.
Meanwhile, some political analysts consider the presence of the Islamic Emirate important in the regional meetings for building economic and political relations.
“According to me, the travel of Muttaqi is a positive step, and it gives the chance for diplomats of the foreign ministry to independently express the position of Afghanistan,” said Wahid Faqiri, a political analyst.
“When a representative of one country goes to another country, it provides the grounds for growth,” said Abdul Zuhor Mudabir, an economist.
Following the Moscow Format meeting, this is the second visit of the acting Foreign Minister to participate in a regional meeting.
Muttaqi Leads Delegation to China to Attend Trans-Himalaya Forum
Government’s planned crackdown makes the future of an estimated 1.7 million Afghans in Pakistan uncertain.
Pakistan has ordered all undocumented immigrants, mainly nearly 1.73 million Afghan nationals, to voluntarily leave the country or face deportations.
“We have given them a November 1 deadline,” Interior Minister Sarfraz Bugti said on Tuesday amid claims by Islamabad that 14 of 24 suicide bombings in the country this year were carried out by Afghan nationals.
Bugti said an estimated 1.73 million Afghan nationals in Pakistan have no legal documents to stay, adding that a total of 4.4 million Afghan refugees live in Pakistan.
“There are no two opinions that we are attacked from within Afghanistan and Afghan nationals are involved in attacks on us,” he said. “We have evidence.”
Islamabad has received the largest influx of Afghan refugees since the Soviet invasion of their country in 1979. About 1.3 million Afghans are registered refugees in Pakistan and 880,000 more have legal status to remain, according to the latest United Nations figures.
“If they do not go, … then all the law enforcement agencies in the provinces or federal government will be utilised to deport them,” Bugti said.
It was not immediately clear how Pakistani authorities could ensure the undocumented immigrants leave or how they could find them to expel them.
Pakistan’s announcement, called “harassment” by the Afghan embassy in Islamabad, marked a new low in its relations with Kabul, which have deteriorated since border clashes between the South Asian neighbours last month.
In a statement on X, the embassy said more than 1,000 Afghans have been detained in the past two weeks – half of them despite having a legal right to be in Pakistan.
“Despite the repeated promises of the Pakistan authorities, the arrest and harassment of Afghan refugees by the police in Pakistan continues,” it said.
Fazal Rehman, a 57-year-old Afghan fruit seller in the northwestern city of Peshawar, said he arrived in Pakistan 30 years ago and his children have never been to Afghanistan.
He said he had never felt the need to register with Pakistani authorities and now fears it is too late to do so.
“We request the Pakistan government not to expel us in such a hasty way and allow us either to live here peacefully, or we should be given at least six months to one year time to go back,” he said.
Bugti said from November 1, Pakistan would allow entry only to Afghans with valid passports and visas.
For years, Afghans entering Pakistan through land borders were allowed to use their national identity cards as a travel document.
There is a huge waiting list in Afghanistan for nationals seeking to get passports, and obtaining a Pakistan visa can take months.
Bugti also warned of a crackdown on property and businesses owned by the Afghans in Pakistan.
SOURCE: NEWS AGENCIES
Pakistan wants undocumented migrants to leave by November 1 or get deported
But the Islamic Emirate’s spokesman, Zabiullah Mujahid, said that rights of all citizens of Afghanistan are observed in the country.
A joint statement of the meeting of the heads of states from Central Asia (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan) with the Federal Chancellor of Germany, Olaf Scholz, said that the participants stressed the importance of an inclusive and representative government in Afghanistan with the active participation of all ethnic, religious and political groups, and the respect for and protection of basic human rights and fundamental freedoms of all Afghan citizens, and economic recovery to achieve lasting peace in Afghanistan.
The heads of the state reaffirmed their commitment to developing Afghanistan as a safe, peaceful, stable and prosperous country that respects the human rights and fundamental freedoms of all Afghan citizens, in particular women, girls and ethnic groups.
But the Islamic Emirate’s spokesman, Zabiullah Mujahid, said that rights of all citizens of Afghanistan are observed in the country.
He said that formation of an inclusive government is the internal matter of Afghanistan.
“The cabinet of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan is comprised of all tribes and representatives and the rights of all citizens including women have been ensured in the country,” Mujahid said.
This comes as analysts said that the formation of an inclusive government and respect for women’s rights can pave the way to deal with many challenges in the country.
“I hope the Islamic Emirate brings changes in its actions and understands the sensitivity of the issue, so we can solve the crisis within the country,” said Mohammad Omar Nuhzat, head of the Hizb-e-Ama.
“According to Islam, the government should pass responsibility to the person who is committed to Islam and also an expert at his job,” said Bilal Barwar, a political analyst.
Earlier, the participants of the Moscow Format also stressed the formation of an inclusive government in Afghanistan.
C5+Germany Meeting Stresses Need for Inclusive Govt
Al JazeeraPublished On 1 Oct 2023The move comes due to lack of support from India and increasingly challenging conditions to operate, the embassy says.
The embassy of Afghanistan in India, which owed its allegiance to the former West-backed government, has announced its closure, saying it would cease operations starting from October 1.
The Afghan embassy’s statement on Saturday said it wanted to reach an agreement with the Indian government to ensure that the interests of Afghans living, working, studying and doing business in India are safeguarded.
Afghans account for around one-third of the nearly 40,000 refugees registered in India, according to the United Nations’ refugee agency. But that figure excludes those who are not registered with the UN.
“There has been a significant reduction in both personnel and resources available to us, making it increasingly challenging to continue operations,” the statement said.
The closure comes more than two years after the Taliban government stormed back to power triggering the collapse of the government of President Ashraf Ghani in the wake of the US withdrawing its troops after 20 years of war and occupation.
“It is with profound sadness, regret, and disappointment that the Embassy of Afghanistan in New Delhi announces this decision to cease its operations,” the embassy said.
The decision was taken due to lack of “crucial support” from India which has hampered the embassy’s capacity to carry out the embassy’s duties, read the statement.
There were also shortcomings in meeting the expectations to best serve Afghani citizens due to “the absence of a legitimate functioning government in Kabul”, read the statement, referring to the Taliban administration.
The closure follows reports that the ambassador and other senior diplomats had left India in recent months, with infighting among those remaining in New Delhi. But the embassy rejected speculations regarding internal infighting among its staff, stressing that these were “unfounded” rumours.
India will take control of the embassy in a caretaker capacity, it said.
At the time of publication, India’s foreign ministry did not issue any statement in response to the announcement.
No country officially recognises Afghanistan’s new government, but acknowledge the Taliban as the de facto ruling authority.
This has left many Afghan embassies and consulates in limbo, with diplomats appointed by the former government refusing to cede control of embassy buildings and property to representatives chosen by the Taliban authorities.
India has not recognised the Taliban government, which seized power in Afghanistan in August 2021. It evacuated its own staff from Kabul ahead of the US withdrawal from Afghanistan two years ago and no longer has a diplomatic presence there.
Yet, New Delhi is keen to retain ties with the country where its regional rival Pakistan wields considerable influence. Indian envoys have previously met Taliban representatives in Doha, the capital of Qatar, where the group has an office.
Last year, India sent relief materials, including wheat, medicine, COVID-19 vaccines and winter clothes to Afghanistan to help with shortages there.
In June last year, India sent a team of officials to its embassy in Kabul.
Before the Taliban took control, India provided Afghan security forces with training and military equipment but had no troops on the ground. It was also the region’s largest provider of development aid to Afghanistan.
SOURCE: AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES
Afghanistan closes embassy in India citing lack of diplomatic support
In cities and villages across Afghanistan, men with no formal legal training but with membership in the Taliban and a rudimentary grasp of 8th-century Islamic jurisprudence wield unprecedented power over the fate of defendants and the resolution of civil disputes.
Under this summary judicial system, most cases are resolved swiftly, often receiving a verdict on the very first appearance before a tribunal. Plaintiffs and defendants make brief presentations, and a judgment is rendered.
Even in the most serious criminal cases, the absence of prosecutors investigating and presenting the facts to a jury or court means that thorough judgments are a rarity.
The Taliban dismantled Afghanistan’s attorney-general office in 2021, deeming it an unnecessary bureaucratic appendage that fostered corruption and inefficiency.
Under the new system, every aspect — from assigning cases to charging and sentencing — must be carried out in the presence of a judge without the involvement of public prosecutors, according to Abdul Malik Haqqani, the Taliban’s deputy chief justice.
“A judge cannot base his decision on a prosecutor’s investigations. This is our Sharia principles,” Haqqani told a local television channel this week.
Farid Hamidi, Afghanistan’s former attorney-general who now lives in the United States, described the dissolution of the attorney-general’s office as a mortal blow to justice in the country.
“A prosecutor’s only job is to help judges have all the facts before issuing a verdict on a case,” Hamidi told VOA. “This is a widely accept principle all over the world, which aims to ensure only justice is served.”
When the Taliban seized power in 2021, they not only dismantled the attorney-general’s office but persecuted former prosecutors who had previously built criminal cases against thousands of Taliban insurgents.
Thousands of prisoners the Taliban set free from jails across Afghanistan in 2021 have sought to carry out reprisals against prosecutors and judges resulting in the killings of more than a dozen former prosecutors, the U.N. human rights body reported in January.
Speed
What sets the Taliban’s justice system apart is its speed.
Unburdened by bureaucratic red tape, Taliban judges have resolved more than 200,000 cases in the past two years, including thousands that had been backlogged in the previous government’s judiciary.
However, critics argue that expeditious verdicts should not come at the cost of true justice.
“They are sacrificing justice for speed,” said Hamidi.
Afghans, who often complained about the sluggishness and bureaucracy of the former government’s courts, have praised the Taliban’s swift justice.
“Sometimes justice delayed is justice denied and sometimes it is most important to move incrementally and achieve a result based on better information,” Neal Davins, a professor of law at William & Mary Law School, told VOA.
The United Nations and human rights bodies have denounced the Taliban’s criminal justice system as brutally harsh.
While the Taliban defend public displays of corporal punishment as consistent with Islamic law, the U.N. deems them inhumane and violations of international conventions against torture.
The Taliban also claim effective enforcement of court orders, contrasting it with the reported shortcomings of the former Afghan government in implementing justice over powerful individuals.
In a bizarre event in November 2015, Khalilullah Ferozi, a banker sentenced to jail for financial crimes, walked out of his cell to sign a multi-million-dollar real estate contract with the Ministry of Urban Development.
In another widely reported incident in November 2016, a former vice president who was accused of detaining and sexually assaulting a tribal rival in Kabul brazenly bore no legal or penal responsibility.
Absolute monarchy
The Taliban have suspended Afghanistan’s constitution guaranteeing the political and administrative independence of the judiciary.
There is also no written document stipulating the appointment of judges, their authorities and judicial accountability.
“We are only accountable to our leader…matters related to authorities of Sultan and King are referred to our leader,” said Haqqani, the deputy chief justice.
That the judiciary is accountable only to the Sultan, according to Haqqani, is a testament to its independence from both internal and external interventions.
For decades, the Taliban fought the previous Afghan government, accusing it of being a puppet regime serving foreign interests.
While they claim total independence in the way they now govern Afghanistan, the Taliban have widely been reported as a proxy of the Pakistani military — accusations both Pakistan and the Taliban reject.
“The powers and limits of every public institution must be enshrined in a public document or a constitution. Without that the independence of judiciary has no actual meaning,” contended Hamidi.
The absence of written laws has left judicial verdicts open to varying interpretations of broad Islamic rules.
That legal ambiguity has led to serious human rights violations, such as the indefinite detention and torture of individuals without specified charges or the right to a court hearing.
The Taliban’s intelligence agency, for instance, has indefinitely detained and tortured individuals on charges not specified in any law without giving detainees a right to a court hearing, according to independent human rights organizations.
Matiullah Weesa, an activist for girls’ education, has been languishing in Taliban detention for about six months without charges.
Backed by the United States, the former Afghan government had a progressive constitution, which, although symbolic and marred by allegations of violations, sought to distribute power democratically with equal rights for all citizens, regardless of gender.
“A constitution is only as good as the people who interpret/enforce it. It typically serves a useful purpose in constraining government and protecting individual rights — but only if it is treated with respect,” said Davins.
Like other parts of the Taliban’s government, women are excluded from work at the judiciary and there are not any female judges to address disputes among female plaintiffs and defendants.
Called the world’s only gender-apartheid regime, the Taliban definitely claim they have given Afghanistan a better justice system than the one built with large international support.
Taliban Undertake Speedy Overhaul of Afghanistan’s Justice System
PARIS, Sept 29 (Reuters) – There are no talks with the Taliban to negotiate a peace settlement, Afghan anti-Taliban leader Ahmad Massoud said on Thursday, vowing to step up “guerrilla warfare” to bring the hardline Islamists to the negotiating table.
Speaking in an interview in Paris, Massoud, the exiled leader of the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan (NRF), said that the only way for the Taliban to achieve legitimacy would be to hold elections, but there was no prospect of that happening for now.
“The Taliban are refusing any talks of negotiation and they just want the world and the people of Afghanistan to just accept that this is the only way going forward, which it is not,” said Massoud, son of the former anti-Soviet mujahideen commander Ahmad Shah Massoud, said late on Thursday.
The NRF groups opposition forces loyal to Massoud. It opposed the Taliban takeover and clashes have occurred since August 2021 between the two sides in the resistance movement’s stronghold of Panjshir, north of the capital Kabul.
Massoud, who operates from overseas, said the NRF had been forced to change tactics because it could not fight the well-equipped Taliban conventionally.
“We chose last year a more pragmatic approach and that is guerrilla warfare. That is why you see less of us but more impact,” he said, adding that the number of fighters had grown from 1,200 to 4,000.
The 34-year-old, who was in Paris to launch a new book, said his fighters were not receiving any military assistance, but were relying on stocks from the decades of war in the country and needed ammunition.
“It is enough to be a headache for the Taliban, but not to topple them or to create too much pain for them so they come for proper, meaningful talks. So, this is the thing the world must understand,” he said.
Massoud dismissed any suggestion of returning to Afghanistan as part of a Taliban reintegration scheme of former officials.
“Those people who left Afghanistan, they left for more than just house or a car. They left for noble causes. They left for some principles,” he said.
“If the Taliban announced that they accept elections, today we all can return because this is what we want.”
The most recent elections in Afghanistan were held under the U.S.-backed administration which Taliban deposed in August 2021 when Western troops withdrew. The Taliban dissolved the country’s elections commission in December 2021.
Many Western governments do not formally recognise the Taliban administration, notably over its treatment of women in the country. But there is little pressure or desire to once again get involved in the country with their focus primarily on the war in Ukraine.
“We try to tell the West that maybe you’re busy with Ukraine, but at the same time, you need to pay attention to the situation in Afghanistan because the situation in Afghanistan is a ticking bomb,” Massoud said.
Reporting by John Irish; Editing by Michael Perry
No current talks with Taliban, Afghanistan’s Massoud says, promising guerrilla warfare
The Chinese special envoy for Afghanistan, Yue Xiaoyong, said the US and its allies caused destruction in Afghanistan over the past two decades.
The fifth Moscow Format was held on Friday in the city of Kazan in Russia, where participants exchanged views on the formation of an inclusive government and ensuring human rights as well as counter-terrorism.
The representatives of more than 10 countries participated in the Moscow format.
Speaking at the Moscow Format, acting Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi said that the Islamic Emirate doesn’t prescribe methods of governance to others, so it expects regional countries to engage with the Islamic Emirate instead of giving prescriptions for the formation of the government of Afghanistan.
“We call on all countries, particularly the neighboring countries, to not prescribe governance to us but instead start officially to work in all areas with the Islamic Emirate,” he said.
The Russian special envoy for Afghanistan, Zamir Kabulov, said the Taliban failed to take proper actions against the terrorist groups including Daesh in Afghanistan.
“Western countries, which caused irreparable harm to the Afghan people, should bear the primary burden of rebuilding the country. In this regard, Washington’s blocking of Afghan financial assets is counterproductive and only exacerbates the situation,” said Kabulov.
“It further complicates the already challenging living conditions for ordinary Afghans. Under any circumstances, we consider the return of US and NATO military infrastructure to the territory of Afghanistan and neighboring states to be unacceptable, regardless of the reasons they may put forward on this matter.”
The Chinese special envoy for Afghanistan, Yue Xiaoyong, said the US and its allies caused destruction in Afghanistan over the past two decades.
“The regional and international community should keep on urging the US to live up to its commitments for Afghanistan and live up to its responsibility to Afghanistan. As we know, 20 years of America and NATO’s occupation is major reason now what we have seen happening … the destruction and suffering of Afghan people. The US and its allies have cut up aid, frozen Afghanistan’s oversees assets and imposed unilateral sanctions worsening the suffering of Afghan people,” Xiaoyong said.
The envoys from Pakistan and Iran also stressed the need for engagement with Afghanistan but called for the formation of an inclusive government in the country.
Hassan Kazimi Qomi, Iran’s special envoy for Afghanistan, stressed the need “to ensure rights to education without gender discrimination, and for a legitimate political government in which all ethnic groups of Afghanistan be accepted, and for the guarantee of security of the neighbors.”
The envoys of Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar and Turkey were invited to the Moscow Format as observers.
Moscow Meeting on Afghanistan Addresses Inclusive Govt, Rights, Terrorism
Speaking at a press conference, he said that “keeping the girls” out of their schools is not going to strengthen the country.
The president of the 78th session of the General Assembly of the United Nations, Dennis Francis, called on the “Taliban to reconsider” policies regarding the education and work of women and girls in Afghanistan.
Speaking at a press conference, he said that “keeping the girls” out of their schools is not going to strengthen the country.
“Women and girls have unalienable rights, human rights that must be upheld and honored. So I would urge the Afghan authorities to reconsider the policy and allow girls to go to school to get an education. So that they can play a role in the development of the community and the society,” Francis said.
The Islamic Emirate said that the Islamic Emirate does not oppose the rights of education for girls and that efforts are underway to reach a “proper and logical stance” in this regard.
“We deny that the ground for their education will not be paved or that we are against education but we are working on a procedure which will take some time, ” said Zabiullah Mujahid, Islamic Emirate’s Spokesman.
However, a women’s rights activist said that the international community lacks a practical process to take actions in support of female education in Afghanistan.
“They should stop talking and making statements. They should take practical actions, so that the situation of women and girls improves in Afghanistan. Currently, they are seeing all issues about women through statements, said Frozan Daudzai, a women’s rights activist.
Earlier, the UN special rapporteur for Afghanistan, Richard Bennett, said that the “Afghan women must be meaningfully included with policy decisions … made within Afghanistan or by the international community.”
UN Official Urges “Taliban to Reconsider” Policy on Female Education, Work
The United Nations says aid workers are still in a “race against time” to remove rubble and rebuild after the devastating earthquake struck eastern Afghanistan last month, killing at least 2,200 people and cutting off remote areas.
The 6.0-magnitude quake on Aug. 31 was shallow, destroying or causing extensive damage to low-rise buildings in the mountainous region. It hit late at night, and homes — mostly made of mud, wood, or rocks — collapsed instantly, becoming death traps.
Satellite data shows that about 40,500 truckloads of debris still needs to be cleared from affected areas in several provinces, the United Nations Development Program said Wednesday. Entire communities have been upended and families are sleeping in the open, it added.
The quake’s epicenter was in remote and rugged Kunar province, challenging rescue and relief efforts by the Taliban government and humanitarian groups. Authorities deployed helicopters or airdropped army commandos to evacuate survivors. Aid workers walked for hours on foot to reach isolated communities.
“This is a race against time,” said Devanand Ramiah, from the UNDP’s Crisis Bureau. “Debris removal and reconstruction operations must start safely and swiftly.”
People’s main demands were the reconstruction of houses and water supplies, according to a spokesman for a Taliban government committee tasked with helping survivors, Zia ur Rahman Speenghar.
People were getting assistance in cash, food, tents, beds, and other necessities, Speenghar said Thursday. Three new roads were under construction in the Dewagal Valley, and roads would be built to areas where there previously were none.
“Various countries and organizations have offered assistance in the construction of houses but that takes time. After the second round of assistance, work will begin on the third round, which is considering what kind of houses can be built here,” the spokesman said.
Afghanistan is facing a “perfect storm” of crises, including natural disasters like the recent earthquake, said Roza Otunbayeva, who leads the U.N. mission to the country.
Afghanistan Peace Campaign
