P.O.Box 21375, Washington, D.C. 20009

Harris was ‘last person in the room’ on Afghan exit, but her influence is unclear

August 8, 2024
The Washington Post
The vice president’s role in the Afghanistan withdrawal suggests her limits in meaningfully altering President Biden’s course on historic choices.

When Joe Biden’s presidency began in 2021, Afghan official Nader Nadery knew that the new commander in chief was determined to pull U.S. troops from his country.

But Nadery, like other Afghans who feared the return of a repressive Taliban regime that had been overthrown in 2001, hoped he had an ally who could persuade Biden to leave some forces behind until the Taliban agreed to a peace deal: Vice President Kamala Harris.

While Harris had backed Biden’s pledge to end the bloody and costly 20-year military operation, she had also been outspoken about protecting women and children after the United States pulled out. “I want to ensure that the country is on a path to stability, that we protect the gains that have been made for Afghan women and others,” Harris said in 2019 while running for president.

When the withdrawal turned chaotic and deadly in August 2021, with the Taliban taking over and women quickly losing many of their rights, Nadery and others wondered if Harris ever counseled the president to take a different course. “I hoped that President Biden listened to her and other voices who advocated for Afghan women,” said Nadery, who served as an adviser to then-Afghan President Ashraf Ghani.

Harris’s role behind the scenes in one of the most consequential and controversial episodes of Biden’s presidency shows how she has sought to position herself as a vice president deeply involved in key moments — even agreeing with an interviewer that she was the “last person in the room” with Biden as he cemented his plans to pull out the troops and evacuate allies.

But it also suggests the limits of her ability — or willingness — to meaningfully alter Biden’s course on historic choices. She raised important questions about the Afghanistan withdrawal before the calamitous, 17-day evacuation from Kabul but did not push for any alternative policy, according to officials who attended meetings that included her and who provided new details about the matter to The Washington Post.\

One former senior military official involved in the deliberations said that Harris asked sharp questions “like a district attorney” during interagency meetings early in 2021 but revealed little about what she was thinking on the issue.

Another former military official involved at the time said he does not recall Harris “playing any role of significance” during policy deliberations in 2021, but said it is possible she sought out Biden outside National Security Council meetings that he led.

Harris declined to comment. A Harris aide said in an emailed statement that the vice president was fully involved in briefings in which she asked “probing questions.” The aide said Harris “strongly supported President Biden’s decision to end America’s longest war,” adding, “We’re not going to get into the Vice President’s private counsel to the President.”

Republicans have hammered the Biden administration in congressional hearings about the deadly aftermath of the withdrawal, including an Islamic State suicide bombing that killed 13 U.S. troops and an estimated 170 Afghans. Former president Donald Trump also had made it a centerpiece of his campaign against Biden — but Harris’s role in the decision-making, thus far, has been little scrutinized.

“Al Gore found himself in that box. Joe Biden found himself in that box. And she [Harris] has found herself in that box,” Klain said. “You have to just be part of a team. You don’t get to argue your own brief” publicly.

There was precedent for a vice president splitting from a president on Afghanistan policy, though — one set by Biden years earlier when he served under President Barack Obama.

‘Boxed in’

As Obama prepared in 2009 to send tens of thousands more troops to Afghanistan, Biden’s view on the military intervention darkened amid the possibility that his son Beau, who had served in Iraq, might have to deploy there.

Biden sent a classified fax to Obama, arguing that the president’s plans were a mistake, and then wrote in his personal notebook that he was “thinking I should resign in protest over what will bring his administration down,” according to a special counsel’s report released this year on Biden’s handling of classified material.

But Biden also wrote that he felt “boxed in by knowing or at least feeling that my resignation would only harden his position and leave him with less voice.”

In private, Biden made clear his view that protecting Afghan women from the Taliban was not a cause worth U.S. military involvement. In a 2010 meeting with Richard Holbrooke, the Obama administration’s special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, Biden said, according to Holbrooke’s diary: “I am not sending my boy back there to risk his life on behalf of women’s rights! It just won’t work, that’s not what they’re there for.”

Obama rejected Biden’s view and approved an increase in troops in December 2009 by more than 30,000, to more than 100,000 the following summer — although by the end of his time in office, he ultimately reduced the number of troops in Afghanistan to about 8,400. Trump as president then deliberated for months on how to handle Afghanistan after taking office in January 2017, approving a Pentagon request to increase troop numbers to about 14,000 that fall before souring on the conflict and changing course.

Meanwhile, Harris, who had been elected to the Senate in 2016, flew to Afghanistan in December 2018 as part of a bipartisan delegation that met with the top U.S. commander at the time, Gen. Austin “Scott” Miller, and stopped in Kabul, Kandahar and Mazar-e Sharif. The trip was low-profile, with no press engagements. Harris, in a statement after her visit, said she was “eager” to find a political solution that would allow American personnel to come home.

But she also made a point of emphasizing the risks for women in Afghanistan if the United States left. In August 2019, as she sought the Democratic presidential nomination, she laid out her vision for pulling troops from the country in a questionnaire from the Council on Foreign Relations, saying she would bring together military, national security and diplomatic officials to coordinate a plan that would ensure the country was stable and that “we protect the gains that have been made for Afghan women and others, and that it never again becomes a safe haven for terrorists.”

While the Democratic candidates in the 2020 primary all wanted to pull troops out, they diverged on the details of how that could be done without Afghanistan falling into chaos and again become a breeding ground for terrorists. Biden said that he would leave behind a small number of Special Forces “to be able to deal with the potential threat unless we got a real good negotiation accomplished to deal with terrorism.” Harris, before withdrawing from the race in December 2019, told the New York Times “the question is the type of presence,” saying she would give support to the Afghan government “in a way that they keep their country secure.”

The Trump administration in February 2020 signed a deal with the Taliban, promising to get all U.S. troops out of Afghanistan by May 2021 — a pledge Biden and Harris would be left to ponder after taking office.

‘The last person in the room’

In early 2021, Harris began meeting regularly with Biden about the details of pulling out troops from Afghanistan, according to Klain.

“She advised the president on that. She advised the president on the evacuation,” Klain said. He declined to disclose details of that advice.

Biden announced in April 2021 that U.S. troops would be withdrawn within months. Shortly after the decision, Harris was asked on CNN whether she was “the last person in the room” to express a view before Biden made his decision.

“Yes,” Harris responded.

“And you feel comfortable?” the CNN reporter asked.

“I do,” Harris responded.

A senior military official and a second former official familiar with the discussions said Biden’s views on the matter by that time appeared so deeply entrenched that they did not believe Harris was influential in his thinking.

Biden’s decision had gone against the advice of Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and senior military officers, including Gen. Mark A. Milley, then chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. They had recommended leaving a small force of about 2,500 troops to prop up the Afghan government, carry out counterterrorism operations and allow the U.S. intelligence community to keep a foothold in a country where numerous terrorist groups were based.

Adela Raz, who had been Afghanistan’s ambassador to the United Nations since 2019, moved in July 2021 to become Kabul’s representative in Washington. From that perch, Raz said in an interview, she watched as the Biden policy unfolded, and she feared for its impact on her homeland. But she said that she had no illusions that Harris could influence Biden to alter his decision because his mind was made up — and she also didn’t believe Afghanistan was a significant matter for the vice president.

“I’m not questioning her ability and capacity, not at all,” the former ambassador said. “Because I strongly believe in strong women, and I think she is one of those. But I felt, when I started to have conversation with the larger diplomatic community in Washington, that she was dealing was a challenging portfolio, and the issue of Afghanistan was not really brought into her file.”

As the withdrawal neared its conclusion in August, Afghanistan descended into chaos. Taliban militants launched a bloody, successful offensive against U.S.-backed Afghan forces, and security across the country crumbled. The Taliban seized control of Kabul on Aug. 15, forcing the Biden administration to scramble thousands of U.S. troops back to Afghanistan in what would become an exhausting, deadly effort to evacuate allies and officials.

More than 124,000 people were successfully airlifted to safety as the Taliban took power, but the operation was marked by scenes of desperate Afghans pleading for help — and then the deadly bombing at the edge of Kabul’s airport and an errant U.S. drone strike that killed an aid worker and nine other people, including seven children.

Nadery, who worked on peace negotiations with the Taliban, was traveling to Qatar to talk to Taliban officials about what he hoped would be a political settlement with that group and the Afghan government as the chaos broke out. He was never able to return to his homeland and now resides in the United States.

Fawzia Koofi, who had been the first female deputy speaker of Afghanistan’s parliament and who also was a government peace negotiator, said she, too, had hoped Harris would persuade Biden to keep enough troops in the country to enable a peace deal to be made.

“We had hoped she would be able to at least influence the policies of President Biden,” she said, but has been left to wonder whether “the Biden policy influenced her.” Koofi, who was in Kabul when the Taliban took over, left shortly thereafter and now heads a group called Women for Afghanistan.

Harris, meanwhile, during the evacuation embarked on a previously scheduled trip to Singapore and Vietnam, where she was confronted with pointed questions about the violence thousands of miles away — and in particular the likely fate of women left behind.

“The Taliban claims it will respect women’s rights within Islamic law. How will the U.S. hold the Taliban accountable on this?” one reporter asked at an Aug. 26, 2021, news conference in Hanoi.

Harris responded: “I have worked almost my entire career on a number of issues but with a particular emphasis on the protection of women and children. And there’s no question that any of us who are paying attention are concerned about that issue in Afghanistan.” She pledged that the United States would work with allies to protect women and children in the region.

With the Taliban grabbing power, a coalition of women’s groups signed a letter in late August 2021 to Biden and Harris saying that “the very lives and futures of Afghan women and girls” were in “grave danger.” It said that “Vice President Kamala Harris has worked over many years for women’s rights, especially women of color” and appealed to her and Biden to protect their rights.

Asked what Harris did in the aftermath of the pullout to protect women and children, the Harris aide cited calls that she made to world leaders thanking them for their assistance in the evacuation.

“The Vice President has been a strong champion for the rights of women and girls around the world, and before and after the withdrawal she has always been focused on doing whatever we can to support the women of Afghanistan,” the aide in a statement.

A dramatic loss

Within weeks of the last U.S. plane leaving Kabul, the Taliban cracked down on women’s rights: enacting a ban on secondary female education, banning women from many jobs and requiring strict dress codes with coverings from head to toe. Afghan women abruptly lost much of what they had gained during the 20 years that American troops were in the country.

Harris lamented that dramatic loss, posting on March 23, 2023, on social media: “I am deeply saddened by the first anniversary of the ban on girls’ secondary school attendance in Afghanistan, and by the prohibition on university education for Afghan women. We will never stop championing the rights of women and girls around the world.”

Such pronouncements left Afghans such as Nadery wondering if she had been able to similarly champion women’s rights with Biden as he plotted the American exit. Nadery said that while Harris supported humanitarian aid for Afghan women, he believes “she was less public about it” because of what he called Biden’s lack of interest in the issue and his strict control of information about the decision.

Sima Samar, chairwoman of the nongovernmental Afghanistan Human Rights Center, said in an interview that she, like Nadery, had hoped Harris would have been able to do more. Samar, an Afghan who was visiting family in the United States when the Kabul government collapsed, said the aftermath of the withdrawal and Taliban takeover is that “Afghanistan has turned out to be a prison for women without the boundary walls around it. It is the only country that has put an official ban on girl’s education and women’s education beyond the sixth grade.”

When Biden was the presumptive Democratic nominee for president, Republicans sought to keep the chaos in Afghanistan in the spotlight, signaling they believed it was a key vulnerability in his reelection effort. At the Republican National Convention last month, representatives from six of the families of U.S. troops killed in the airport bombing took the stage, a visceral reminder of the tragedy. Christy Shamblin, the mother-in-law of Sgt. Nicole Gee, one of the Marines killed, told the crowd that Biden had “refused to recognize their sacrifice.” Rep. Michael Waltz (R.-Fla.) said that everyone remembers “Biden’s disgraceful withdrawal from Afghanistan.”

With Harris now supplanting Biden atop the Democratic ticket, it remains to be seen if she will face similar conservative blowback over her nebulous role in the decision to pull the military from Afghanistan.

Now that she is the nominee, Harris can articulate her own policy on Afghanistan — though she has yet to speak in depth about how she would handle the Taliban if elected. Harris will be able to “go with her own instincts and not have to worry what someone down the hall thinks,” Klain said.

Shawn VanDiver, a Navy veteran who founded #AfghanEvac, a coalition of organizations helping Afghans who collaborated with Americans during the war, said that Harris’s advisers assured him recently that she is committed to Afghan relocation efforts and looking for new ways to assist.

Khalid Payenda, who was acting finance minister from January to August 2021, said he hopes Harris recognizes that many of the same issues that led to American involvement remain, including the nation being a base for terrorists. Whoever is elected president, Payenda said, “those threats [are] still very much relevant.”

The Harris aide said in the emailed statement that the White House is “vigilant against any terrorist threats directed at the United States,” adding that the “Biden-Harris Administration continues to press the Taliban to respect the human rights and fundamental freedoms of all Afghans, especially women and girls.”

Aaron Schaffer contributed to this report.

Harris was ‘last person in the room’ on Afghan exit, but her influence is unclear
read more

Afghanistan 100m runner Kimia Yousofi sends Olympic message to the Taliban

August 8, 2024
 at the Stade de France
The Guardian
Fri 2 Aug 2024 10.53 EDT

The world’s fastest women flew down the Olympic straight in the 100m heats on the first morning of athletics at the Stade de France, but one carried a heavier burden. Kimia Yousofi, part of the six-person Afghan team competing in Paris, trailed the rest of the pack and finished two seconds behind the winner.

Afterwards, she held up words scribbled on an A4 piece of paper. “Education” written in black. “Sport” underneath it in green. In red, the third colour of the Afghanistan flag, “our rights”. “I have a message for Afghan girls,” she said. “Don’t give up, don’t let others decide for you. Just search for opportunity, and then use that opportunity,” she said.

The 28-year-old carried the country’s flag at the Tokyo Games, but fled to Iran when the Taliban took control in 2021. Her team in Paris is made up of three men and three women, selected by the Afghanistan Olympic Committee which operates outside the country. “I just want to represent Afghan people with this flag, our culture. Our girls in Afghanistan, our women, they want basic rights, education and sport,” she said.

Dual Olympian track sprinter Kimia Yousofi has been selected for Afghanistan at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games.
Australia-based sprinter ‘honoured’ to represent oppressed women after making Afghan Olympic team

Amnesty International has described the Taliban’s restrictions on the rights of women and girls in Afghanistan as “draconian”. Public stoning for adultery was reintroduced in March. Yousofi said women are not considered human. “To be able to decide for their life, that has been taken away from them for the last two years. We are fighting for that.”

Of the six Afghan athletes in Paris, the Taliban recognises only the men. “Only three athletes are representing Afghanistan,” Atal Mashwani, the spokesperson of the Taliban government’s sports directorate, said last month, referring to the male competitors. Despite the potential for tension within the team, Yousofi said her male teammates support her. “The condition for many in Afghanistan also is terrible,” she said. “The problem for men is a little bit less, but they have problem as well for everything.”

When the Taliban came to power, the international sporting community worked to secure safe passage for athletes that may have been threatened by the new regime. Yousofi said she initially wanted to stay in Kabul but was advised she would not be safe. “I was just searching around for 10 days after I left Afghanistan. I was searching what should I do? What can I do?”

The Australian Olympic Committee (AOC) and successive governments worked together to secure a visa for her and her family in Australia, where they moved in 2022. The AOC chief executive, Matt Carroll, said her visa in Iran was only temporary, and a potential return to Afghanistan would have been extremely dangerous. “I’ll have to admit, I’ve never worked in this space before – getting people evacuated from countries,” the sports administrator said.

The Paris Games have espoused gender equality, promoting that half the athletes competing are women. Still coughing after the race from a combination of exertion and a dairy allergy, Yousofi was asked what she thought of that message. She said “in my mind I already have equal gender” and it was something on which others must reflect.

“Those people who don’t have this message, they think they can decide this for everyone. No, they can’t decide this for everyone,” she said. “This message is for them.”

Afghanistan 100m runner Kimia Yousofi sends Olympic message to the Taliban
read more

‘I fled Afghanistan to achieve my Olympic dream’

August 8, 2024
Kawoon Khamoosh
BBC World Service
6 August 2024

Manizha Talash knew the moment she first saw a video of a man spinning on his head that she would dedicate her life to breaking – a style of street dance.

But it is a dream for which she has risked her life, and the lives of her family, in order to fulfil. It has forced her to flee her country, and hide her identity.

Now, as she prepares to step out on the world stage at the Paris Olympics, Manizha reveals her fight to become Afghanistan’s first female breaker.

Manizha came to breaking late.

She had initially tried shoot boxing, turning to the Japanese martial art that mixes wrestling and kickboxing as a way to protect herself as she worked alongside her father, selling groceries from his cart in the streets of the capital Kabul.

But a few matches in, she broke her shoulder and had to give up.

Then, aged 17, she saw the video of the man on his head – and soon discovered the Superiors Crew, a breaking collective based in Kabul.

She fell in love.

“I couldn’t believe it was real,” she says.

At the same time, she heard breaking would make its debut at the Paris 2024 Olympics. The dream was born – she just had to get there.

But it clearly wasn’t going to be easy from the start.

She visited the Superiors Crew’s training club in western Kabul, which was considered the country’s pioneering centre for hip-hop and breaking, but it was not quite what she expected.

“When I entered the club it was full of boys,” Manizha recalls.

The Superiors Crew’s coach, Jawad Saberi, was also quick to size Manizha up too.

“She was so small,” he remembers. “I was doubtful because there were other b-girls who didn’t stay long,” he says, using the term for a female performer.

But her size was the least of their troubles.

Manizha’s passion, shared with Jawad and the Superiors Crew collective, was risky and people were unhappy about it.

“Everyone was judging me… my relatives were saying words behind my back and complained to my mother,” she recalls.

Outside of her immediate family, there were also comments made on social media – which she didn’t take seriously.

But then, in December 2020, a car bomb exploded near the club, bringing the violence which was killing so many across Afghanistan close to home.

“It really scared me,” she admits.

Yet it didn’t stop her. For Jawad, it was all he needed to know.

“We were under attack, but she came back,” he says. “I saw that she had a dream to go to Paris 2024 – she was fighting for it. I said: ‘She can do it.’ I saw the future.”

At home, things had taken a turn for the worse.

Her father had been abducted by insurgents. He has not been seen since.

She became the main breadwinner for her family – a portion of which she saved for training.

But within months of the car bomb, the club was forced to shut its doors.

This time, the threat had come inside.

“Security forces stormed our club, walked over to a man and put a hood on his head,” Manizha recalls. The man, they said, was a would-be suicide bomber who had been staking out the club for some time, planning an attack.

“They told us that this time we were lucky because there were people who wanted to bomb our club and if we loved our lives, we should shut it.”

Even now, Manizha did not stop breaking.

She did make one concession to the danger, however: Manizha changed her last name to Talash meaning “effort” or “hard work” in Farsi. It was a decision she hoped would protect her family in case they were threatened because of her link to the sport.

And then, that August, the Taliban returned.

Superiors Crew A car bomb exploded outside the club where Manizha trained in Kabul
A car bomb exploded outside the club where Manizha trained in Kabul

Suddenly, Manizha’s world – and the world of Afghan women and girls – began to contract.

They were barred from classrooms and gyms and told to wear top-to-toe clothing. Music and dancing were also effectively banned.

The breaking stopped.

The new restrictions forced Manizha and her friends to make a decision – they had to leave the country.

“If I’d stayed in Afghanistan, I don’t think I’d exist,” she says. “They’d execute me or stone me to death.”

Manizha and some members of the Superiors Crew, including Jawad, fled to Madrid in Spain.

They found work, and sent money home. But they also made connections with local breakers and practised anywhere they could – in clubs, on the streets and even in shopping malls.

It wasn’t easy.

“Every night when I got to bed, I’d struggle with lots of questions,” Manizha admits. “‘What can Afghan women do?’ I’d ask myself. ‘Why can’t I do something for them?'”

Superiors Crew Manizha celebrating her 18th birthday with some of the Superiors Crew in Kabul
Manizha celebrating her 18th birthday with some of the Superiors Crew in Kabul

She knew that, following the Taliban’s return, it would be almost impossible to compete for her home country in the Olympics. A small, gender-balanced team of six is taking part under the country’s former flag – put together by the exiled Afghan Olympic committee, with no link to the Taliban.

But Manizha found another route to Paris. She had discovered she was eligible to compete for the Refugee Olympic Team, for athletes whose home countries are experiencing conflict or civil war, making it too dangerous for them to return.

In May, she was one of the athletes selected to represent the Refugee Team at the Games and the International Olympic Committee helped arrange coaching for her.

“When they announced my name, I was happy and upset all at once,” Manizha says. “I was sad because when I left Afghanistan, I had to leave my family behind. I chose my goal over their safety.”

But as she prepares for her Olympic debut on Friday, Manizha can breathe a little easier.

When she walks out in Paris and onto screens across the world, her family will be safe.

Just after she was selected, they managed to flee Afghanistan. Finally, after two years of separation, the family was back together in Spain.

Manizha admits it is unlikely that she will take home a medal from Paris – she still needs to “make up for all those years I lost”. But then, getting a spot on the podium is not her priority.

“I’ll compete for my friends and for their dreams and hopes,” she says.

“The girls of Afghanistan will never surrender. Whatever pressure you put on an Afghan girl – restrict her, or even imprison her – she’ll definitely find a way out and will definitely achieve her goals. We fight and we will win.”

‘I fled Afghanistan to achieve my Olympic dream’
read more

Taliban says millions of Afghans returning home; IOM says millions leaving — who is right?

August 8, 2024
By Ayaz Gul

Voice of America

August 06, 2024

ISLAMABAD — Afghanistan’s ruling Taliban said Tuesday that about 3.7 million former refugees have returned to the country since the Islamist group took power three years ago. The statement was a response to the International Organization for Migration, or IOM, which reported last week that more than twice as many Afghans have left the country since 2020.

Which side is correct? Possibly both.

The dispute began with a July 31 IOM report that said “nearly 8 million Afghans” have departed the country over the last four years.

Of those, said the IOM, 85% moved to neighboring countries, mostly Iran and Pakistan, and almost 1 million headed to Europe. The IOM said almost 70% of Afghans who went to Iran cited a lack of job opportunities as the main factor driving their migration.

The Taliban-run Ministry of Refugees and Returnees challenged the IOM figure, saying there has not been such a significant exodus of people from the country since the Soviet invasion and subsequent decade-long occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s.

“In the last three years alone, 3.7 million Afghan citizens have returned home, marking the first instance of such a substantial influx in the last 40 years in Afghanistan’s history,” the ministry declared.

The ministry accused the U.N. agency of issuing false and misleading figures to attract donor funding.

While neither side’s figure can be independently confirmed, it’s conceivable that both numbers are accurate.

Afghanistan has experienced significant outflows and inflows of people this decade. Many Afghans flee turmoil sparked by the withdrawal of the U.S.-led anti-terrorism coalition and the return to power of the Taliban, who continue to battle Afghan insurgent groups as well as sanctions imposed by Western countries over human rights concerns, mainly laws that ban women from most aspects of public life.

At the same time, many Afghans are getting a cold welcome in what they hoped would be countries of refuge. In its report, the IOM acknowledged that the number of Afghans repatriating from Iran “remains consistently high.” It stated that nearly 1 million Afghans came back home in 2023, with “70% being undocumented and 60% forcibly returned.”

Meanwhile, neighboring Pakistan reported this week that its crackdown on undocumented foreigners in the country has led to the repatriation of nearly 700,000 Afghans in the last 10 months. Another 1.4 million legal Afghan refugees remain in the country.

IOM and its partner agencies have repeatedly urged all countries to “immediately halt the forced returns of Afghans, both in the short and long term, until conditions are established to ensure safe, dignified, and voluntary returns, regardless of legal status.”

Climate change impact

Meanwhile, Save the Children reported Tuesday that extreme weather events forced at least 38,000 people, about half of them children, from their homes in Afghanistan in the first six months of this year.

The aid group said, “While most displacements in recent decades have been due to conflict, in 2022, climate disasters became the main reason people fled their homes and moved to other areas within Afghanistan.”.

The report noted that more than one-third of Afghans are facing crisis levels of hunger, driven mostly by climate shocks and high food prices.

Recent U.N. reports have cited drought as the main reason for disaster-driven displacement in Afghanistan, ranked as the sixth most vulnerable country to the impacts of climate change. The assessments found that 25 of the 34 Afghan provinces “face severe or catastrophic” drought conditions, affecting more than half the country’s more than 40 million population.

The Taliban reclaimed power in August 2021 from the then-internationally backed government in Kabul, as the United States and NATO troops withdrew from the country after almost two decades of involvement in the Afghan war.

No country has officially recognized the fundamentalist Taliban regime over its sweeping restrictions on women’s rights to education, employment, and public life, among other human rights concerns.

The international isolation has deterred potential partners from providing development assistance to help Taliban-ruled Afghanistan in addressing climate change and post-conflict reconstruction challenges.

Taliban says millions of Afghans returning home; IOM says millions leaving — who is right?
read more

Antony Blinken urged to halt US aid to Afghanistan

August 8, 2024
Khaama Press

Fox News reported that U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has been urged to halt U.S. aid to Afghanistan.

According to the media outlet, this request comes after the revelation that nearly $300 million in U.S. aid might have ended up in the hands of the Taliban.

Previously, the Office of the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) reported that two offices within the State Department failed to account for $293 million in U.S. aid to Afghanistan.

Two days ago, U.S. Senator Mike Braun, in a letter to Blinken, described this report as “profoundly alarming” and urged him to suspend U.S. aid to Afghanistan until the issue is resolved.

Senator Braun added that the State Department’s failure to adhere to anti-terrorism inspection standards has “strengthened the Taliban and other terrorist groups.”

He also emphasized that when funds intended for humanitarian and development purposes end up supporting terrorism and perpetuating violence and instability, it undermines U.S. national security.

The Republican senator requested in his letter that the Secretary of State implement corrective measures to prevent similar occurrences in the future.

This call to halt U.S. aid to Afghanistan comes as SIGAR noted in another report that the U.S. has provided approximately $21 billion in aid to Afghanistan over the past three years.

SIGAR stated that these funds have been spent on humanitarian, development, and infrastructure projects, the relocation and resettlement of refugees from Afghanistan to the U.S., and the repayment of Afghan currency reserves.

The ongoing concerns about U.S. aid to Afghanistan highlight significant issues in accountability and oversight, particularly with the risk of funds being misused or diverted to support terrorism.

The calls for halting aid underscore the necessity for stringent measures to ensure that humanitarian and development assistance achieves its intended goals without compromising security or stability.

Implementing robust oversight mechanisms will be crucial in safeguarding both U.S. interests and the intended beneficiaries in Afghanistan.

Antony Blinken urged to halt US aid to Afghanistan
read more

Afghanistan’s population census estimates 35.7 million amid controversy

August 8, 2024
Khaama Press

The Statistics and Information Authority of the Taliban has recently estimated Afghanistan’s population to be 35.7 million in the current solar year 1403.

The authority released the results of its census on Wednesday, August 7, showing that out of the total 35.7 million population of Afghanistan, 18.2 million are men and 17.5 million are women.

Previously, the Taliban’s Statistics and Information Authority had estimated Afghanistan’s population at 34.9 million for the year last solar year 1402.

The Taliban administration has not explained its census methodology, and it is unclear how this estimated figure of the total population of Afghanistan was derived.

This comes in contrast to surveys conducted by international organizations, which estimate Afghanistan’s population to be over 40 million.

The population census in Afghanistan has long been a subject of controversy and dispute. Different methods and tools used by various administrations have resulted in significantly varying estimates. The discrepancies in population figures have raised questions about the accuracy and reliability of the data provided by the authorities.

International organizations and independent experts have often criticized the lack of transparency and the potential political motivations behind the census figures.

Accurate population data is crucial for resource allocation, policy-making, and humanitarian efforts, making the need for a credible and transparent census process even more critical in the context of Afghanistan’s ongoing challenges.

Afghanistan’s population census estimates 35.7 million amid controversy
read more

Iran issues ultimatum for illegal migrants to leave by year-end

August 8, 2024
Khaama Press

In response to increasing reactions regarding the mistreatment of Afghan migrants in Iran, a senior security official has emphasized that “illegal” migrants must leave the country by the end of the current year.

On Wednesday, August 7, IRNA news agency, quoting Ahmad Reza Radan, the Chief Commander of Iran’s Law Enforcement Force, reported that “unauthorized” migrants must leave the country and return to their homeland by the end of the year.

He stated that the policy and plan are based on the return of all “unauthorized individuals” and stressed that “if they move towards the borders, they will be arrested and transferred to camps.”

This comes as a video showing the arrest and torture of an Afghan migrant teenager by Iranian security forces has sparked widespread reactions.

Recently, a video circulating on social media showed a teenager being beaten and tortured by Iranian police on a road.

Previously, the Ministry of Interior of the Islamic Republic had issued a statement emphasizing the expulsion of Afghan migrants, stating that “there is no capacity to accept Afghans in the country, and organizing those who are authorized to stay temporarily is necessary.”

It is worth noting that despite international calls to halt the expulsion of Afghan migrants from Iran and Pakistan, this process continues, with hundreds of individuals entering Afghanistan daily.

The ongoing expulsion of Afghan migrants from Iran, amid reports of mistreatment and torture, underscores a significant humanitarian crisis.

The Iranian government’s stringent policies and the recent viral video have drawn widespread condemnation and highlight the urgent need for international intervention.

Despite calls for halting deportations, the relentless return of Afghan migrants continues, posing severe challenges for the individuals affected and their home countries. The global community must advocate for the protection of migrant rights and address the underlying causes of this migration crisis.

Iran issues ultimatum for illegal migrants to leave by year-end
read more

Anas Haqqani: Violation of Human Rights of Afghan Migrants is Unacceptable

August 8, 2024
TOLOnews
TV Network
8 August 2024

Meanwhile, some social media users have launched a campaign to support Afghan migrants in Iran in response to the mistreatment by Iranian police.

The release of a video on social media showing the mistreatment of an Afghan teenager by Iranian police has sparked reactions. 

Anas Haqqani, a prominent member of the Islamic Emirate, said that xenophobia and the violation of the human rights of Afghan migrants are unacceptable.

Meanwhile, some social media users have launched a campaign to support Afghan migrants in Iran in response to the mistreatment by Iranian police.

Anas Haqqani wrote: “Xenophobia and the violation of the human rights of Afghan migrants are unacceptable. I hope this type of behavior will be stopped and held accountable.”

TOLOnews cannot confirm the exact time and place of the video showing an Iranian security officer mistreating an Afghan teenager.

In recent days, several other videos have been circulated on social media showing mistreatment of Afghan migrants. Some Afghan migrants in Iran have reported being harassed by Iranian citizens and police in recent weeks.

“When you encounter Iranian police, whether you have a passport or not, they beat you severely and then take you to the camp and deport you,” said Mohammad Akbar Sultani, an Afghan migrant in Iran.

Ahmad-Reza Radan, Iran’s chief commander of Law Enforcement, said that unauthorized migrants must leave Iran by the end of this year. Radan said that policies and programs are based on the return of all unauthorized citizens.

Iran’s chief commander of Law Enforcement said: “Regarding unauthorized foreigners, given that the policy and program are based on the return of all unauthorized foreigners to their countries, these individuals must leave the country by the end of the year and return to their countries.”

“Our request to organizations and institutions working in Afghanistan is to quickly implement support plans to prevent greater problems for Afghan migrants deported from Iran,” Ali Reza Karimi, a migrant rights activist, told TOLOnews.

The mistreatment of Afghan migrants in Iran has also triggered reactions from some social media users and Afghan citizens in other countries. Some have said that this behavior towards Afghan migrants is inhumane and against Islamic values.

Anas Haqqani: Violation of Human Rights of Afghan Migrants is Unacceptable
read more

The Taliban says people in Afghanistan on previous government’s visas can stay for now

August 8, 2024
Associated Press
 August 5, 2024
ISLAMABAD (AP) — Afghanistan’s Taliban government said Monday it would allow people in the country on visas issued by the former Western-backed government to stay for now, but that they wouldn’t be allowed back in without documents from a Taliban-approved diplomatic mission.

The announcement by the Taliban’s Foreign Ministry on the social media platform X clarified its July 30 announcement that it would no longer accept documents from consulates and diplomatic missions abroad staffed by member of the former government.

The move is part of the Taliban’s efforts to gain control of Afghanistan’s representation abroad since returning to power in 2021.

The Taliban’s blacklisting of diplomatic missions in Canada, Australia and several European countries means that many people may have to travel hundreds of even thousands of miles to get documents issued, renewed, or certified.

Documents from missions in the UK, Belgium, Switzerland, France, Greece, Italy, Poland, Norway, Sweden, Canada, and Australia are invalid unless they are registered with the ministry in Kabul, the Taliban’s Foreign Ministry said.

The documents otherwise are “invalid due to administrative corruption, lack of transparency and lack of coordination,” the ministry said. It said the documents were in “clear violation of principles,” but did not elaborate on what those principles are.

The Taliban’s Foreign Ministry, which operates diplomatic missions in countries including Pakistan, Iran, and Turkey, said Monday that its “acceptable” diplomatic missions in Europe are the consulate general in Munich, Germany and the country’s embassies in the Netherlands, Spain, Bulgaria, and the Czech Republic.

A statement issued last week by a council representing ambassadors appointed by the previous government said those missions remain committed to providing consular services in collaboration with host country authorities.

“Regrettably, through their miscalculated and short-sighted actions, the Taliban have repeatedly created problems for Afghan refugees and citizens who reside outside their country,” the Coordination Council of Ambassadors and General Consulates of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan said in a statement.

The Taliban’s Foreign Ministry did not respond to questions about the number of Afghans affected by the decision. It said online consular services were not yet available.

In March 2023, the Taliban said they were trying to take charge of more Afghan embassies abroad. Their chief spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid, said the administration had sent diplomats to at least 14 countries.

Many Taliban leaders are under sanctions, and no country recognizes them as Afghanistan’s legitimate rulers.

Afghanistan’s seat at the United Nations is still held by the country’s former government, which was led by Ashraf Ghani, though the Taliban administration is seeking to claim that seat as well.

 

The Taliban says people in Afghanistan on previous government’s visas can stay for now
read more

Children displacement soars in Afghanistan due to climate change

August 8, 2024
Khaama Press

The Save the Children organization has announced that during the first six months of the current calendar year, at least 38,000 people, predominantly children, have been displaced in Afghanistan due to climate change.

The organization reported an increase in internal displacement in Afghanistan compared to 2023, highlighting the plight of internally displaced persons.

According to the report, the number of internally displaced persons in the first six months of 2024 exceeds the total for the entire previous year.

The report identifies drought, rising temperatures, floods, landslides, rainfall, and storms as major factors contributing to displacement in Afghanistan.

According to Save the Children, Afghanistan had over 747,000 displaced children due to natural disasters last year, making it the country with the highest number of child displacements globally, with children constituting 50% of these refugees this year as well.

Afghanistan is recognized as the sixth most vulnerable country to climate change impacts globally, with international organizations consistently warning of increasing humanitarian crises resulting from this phenomenon.

Previously, Save the Children had reported that ongoing floods in Afghanistan have left 40,000 children homeless and claimed the lives of 200 children.

The situation in Afghanistan underscores the urgent need for global attention and support to mitigate the effects of climate change, particularly on vulnerable populations such as children, who are disproportionately affected by natural disasters. Immediate action and international cooperation are crucial to addressing these humanitarian challenges and ensuring the safety and well-being of Afghan children.

Children displacement soars in Afghanistan due to climate change
read more

Recent Posts