Top former US generals say failures of Biden administration in planning drove chaotic fall of Kabul

March 20, 2024 Current News Articles

BY TARA COPP

Associated Press

March 19, 2024

WASHINGTON (AP) — The top two U.S. generals who oversaw the evacuation of Afghanistan as it fell to the Taliban in August 2021 blamed the Biden administration for the chaotic departure, telling lawmakers Tuesday that it inadequately planned for the evacuation and did not order it in time.

The rare testimony by the two retired generals publicly exposed for the first time the strain and differences the military leaders had with the Biden administration in the final days of the war. Two of those key differences included that the military had advised that the U.S. keep at least 2,500 service members in Afghanistan to maintain stability and a concern that the State Department was not moving fast enough to get an evacuation started.

The remarks contrasted with an internal White House review of the administration’s decisions which found that President Joe Biden’s decisions had been “severely constrained” by previous withdrawal agreements negotiated by former President Donald Trump and blamed the military, saying top commanders said they had enough resources to handle the evacuation.

Thirteen U.S. service members were killed by a suicide bomber at the Kabul airport’s Abbey Gate in the final days of the war, as the Taliban took over Afghanistan.

Thousands of panicked Afghans and U.S. citizens desperately tried to get on U.S. military flights that were airlifting people out. In the end the military was able to rescue more than 130,000 civilians before the final U.S. military aircraft departed.

That chaos was the end result of the State Department failing to call for an evacuation of U.S. personnel until it was too late, both former Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Mark Milley and U.S. Central Command retired Gen. Frank McKenzie told the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

“On 14 August the non-combatant evacuation operation decision was made by the Department of State and the U.S. military alerted, marshalled, mobilized and rapidly deployed faster than any military in the world could ever do,” Milley said.

But the State Department’s decision came too late, Milley said.

“The fundamental mistake, the fundamental flaw was the timing of the State Department,” Milley said. “That was too slow and too late.”

Evacuation orders must come from the State Department, but in the weeks and months before Kabul fell to the Taliban, the Pentagon was pressing the State Department for evacuation plans, and was concerned that State was not ready, McKenzie said.

“We had forces in the region as early as 9 July, but we could do nothing,” McKenzie said, calling State’s timing “the fatal flaw that created what happened in August.”

“I believe the events of mid and late August 2021 were the direct result of delaying the initiation of the (evacuation) for several months, in fact until we were in extremis and the Taliban had overrun the country,” McKenzie said.

Milley was the nation’s top-ranking military officer at the time, and had urged President Joe Biden to keep a residual force of 2,500 forces there to give Afghanistan’s special forces enough back-up to keep the Taliban at bay and allow the U.S. military to hold on to Bagram Air Base, which could have provided the military additional options to respond to Taliban attacks.

Biden did not approve the larger residual force, opting to keep a smaller force of 650 that would be limited to securing the U.S. embassy. That smaller force was not adequate to keeping Bagram, which was quickly taken over by the Taliban.

The Taliban have controlled Afghanistan since the U.S. departure, resulting in many dramatic changes for the population, including the near-total loss of rights for women and girls.

The White House found last year that the chaotic withdrawal occurred because President Joe Biden was “constrained” by previous agreements made by President Donald Trump to withdraw forces.

That 2023 internal review further appeared to shift any blame in the Aug. 26, 2021, suicide bombing at Hamid Karzai International Airport, saying it was the U.S. military that made one possibly key decision.

“To manage the potential threat of a terrorist attack, the President repeatedly asked whether the military required additional support to carry out their mission at HKIA,” the 2023 report said, adding, “Senior military officials confirmed that they had sufficient resources and authorities to mitigate threats.”

A message left with the State Department was not immediately returned on Tuesday.

Swedish Group Halts Afghanistan Aid After Taliban Bans Sweden’s Activities

March 20, 2024 Current News Articles

By Ayaz Gul

Voice of America

March 19, 2024

A screenshot of a page from the website of the Swedish Committee for Afghanistan, a humanitarian organization that has suspended its work after the Taliban demanded Sweden halt its activities in Afghanistan. Another page on the site announced the pause in its services.

The Swedish Committee for Afghanistan, a major foreign humanitarian organization, has suspended all its operations following a Taliban decree demanding a halt to Sweden’s activities in the country.

The SCA noted in a statement Tuesday that the Taliban government had issued the decree in response to burnings of the Quran, the Muslim holy book, in Stockholm last year. There was no immediate response from de facto Afghan officials.

“We are extremely saddened by the current situation and the effects our suspension will have on the millions of people who have benefitted from our services over the past four decades,” the non-governmental group said, in a statement.

It said that SCA representatives were seeking talks with Taliban authorities to resolve the situation and ensure that the needs of its target groups are met.

The aid group emphasized that it was an impartial entity with no links to the Swedish government or any government and received funding from a broad range of donors.

The SCA condemned and distanced itself from the burning of copies of the Quran in Sweden.

“Desecration of the Holy Koran is an insult to all Muslims around the world who hold this sacred text dear to their hearts, and it constitutes a flagrant attack on the Islamic faith,” the statement said.

The organization said that it was “gravely concerned” about the future of its nearly 7,000 employees across 16 provinces of Afghanistan. “Many of them are the sole breadwinners of their families, and if they lose their jobs, thousands of families will suffer,” it said.

In 2023, 2.5 million patients visited SCA clinics and hospitals across Afghanistan, while tens of thousands of others, including children, benefited from livelihood support and education programs.

The aid sector in Afghanistan has been severely hampered by a series of restrictions the Islamist Taliban have imposed on local female aid workers since seizing power in August 2021.

The United Nations estimates that more than 24 million Afghans are in need of humanitarian assistance in the country, reeling from years of war and natural disasters.

Aid workers say the Taliban takeover has worsened humanitarian conditions in Afghanistan. Human rights concerns, particularly restrictions on Afghan women’s access to education and work, have deterred the international community from recognizing the Taliban government.

‘Cousins at war’: Pakistan-Afghan ties strained after cross-border attacks

March 19, 2024 Current News Articles

By Abid Hussain

Al Jazeera

Heightened tensions could see a further escalation, warn analysts — and it could strengthen the very armed group that Pakistan wants to target.

Islamabad, Pakistan: Pakistan’s air raids inside Afghanistan on Monday amid rising tensions between the neighbours have injected new uncertainty into ties, say analysts.

The early morning attacks on Monday from Pakistan, according to a detailed statement by the Pakistani foreign ministry, were aimed at hideouts of armed groups including the outlawed Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (Pakistan Taliban, or TTP). Afghan officials said eight people in all — five women and three children — were killed.

The official government statement said that the “terrorists” pose a great threat to the country, and alleged that “they have consistently used Afghan territory to launch terror attacks inside Pakistani territory.”

“Terrorist groups like TTP are a collective threat to regional peace and security. We fully realise the challenge Afghan authorities face in combating the threat posed by TTP. Pakistan would therefore continue to work towards finding joint solutions in countering terrorism and to prevent any terrorist organisation from sabotaging bilateral relations with Afghanistan,” the statement said.

The air raids came two days after a group of suicide bombers targeted a Pakistani military checkpost in its North Waziristan district, a border area next to Afghanistan, killing at least seven Pakistani soldiers.

The Afghan Taliban, who have ruled the country since taking over in August 2021, reacted swiftly to the Pakistani attacks, calling them “reckless”. Hours after the air raids, the Afghan military fired mortar shells on Pakistani military positions near border districts, which left four civilians and three soldiers injured.

Zabiullah Mujahid, the Taliban government spokesperson, denied that foreign armed groups are allowed to operate from Afghan soil. But he conceded that parts of the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan were hard to control.

“In this regard, we have made our utmost effort and continue to do so; but one thing we must accept is that Afghanistan shares a very long border area with Pakistan, and there are places with rugged terrain including mountains and forests, and places that might be out of our control,” Mujahid said in response.

Sami Yousafzai, a journalist and a longtime observer of Pakistan-Afghanistan ties, described the spat as a fight between two cousins.

“These two neighbours act like they are cousins. They cannot leave each other, but they cannot find a way to fix their relationship either. And in all this fighting, it is impacting the public-to-public relations between them,” he told Al Jazeera.

For years, Pakistan was seen as a patron of the Afghan Taliban, which first rose to power in 1996. It was believed to hold considerable sway on the Taliban leadership, whom it sheltered, funded and shielded diplomatically.

Yet amid the United States’s so-called “war on terror”, the Pakistan Taliban emerged and started waging a war against the state of Pakistan, although the group was ideologically aligned with the Afghan Taliban.

The Pakistani army conducted multiple operations to eliminate the Pakistan Taliban, and managed to push some of its leaders into Afghanistan. After the Afghan Taliban returned to Kabul in late 2021, Pakistan hoped to use its historic influence over the new Afghan rulers to contain the Pakistan Taliban.

Instead, attacks grew, and 2023 was among the bloodiest years in recent Pakistani history, with more than 650 attacks across the country, killing nearly 1,000 people, mostly from law enforcement agencies and the military. Most of the attacks on security personnel were claimed by the Pakistan Taliban, along with other relatively lesser-known armed groups.

Over the years, Pakistan has blamed the Pakistan Taliban for several attacks inside its territory, killing thousands of people, including the deadly attack on Army Public School in Peshawar in 2014, which killed more than 130 students.

More than 90 percent of the attacks in 2023 were carried out in the northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and the southwestern province of Balochistan, both of which border Afghanistan.

Syed Akhtar Ali Shah, a former police chief in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, said that such regular attacks against security personnel affects the motivation of the forces and Pakistan had little option but to retaliate.

Shah also noted that Pakistan had the added experience of a similar level of cross-border action earlier in the year against Iran, which perhaps emboldened the military.

In January this year, Iranian forces launched a cross-border attack inside Pakistan, targeting hideouts of an armed group that it claimed works against the interest of state of Iran.

Within 24 hours, the Pakistani government responded with attacks of its own inside Iran’s Sestan-Baluchestan province, targeting what it claimed was armed groups seeking protection in Iran.

After the tit-for-tat action, Pakistan and Iran managed to calm those tensions, with the Iranian foreign minister visiting Pakistan the same month.

Shah, the former police chief, believed that Pakistan perhaps learned a lesson from that incident and decided to show “muscle”. But he also added a word of caution.

“When you take an aggressive stance like that, it helps to have a dialogue from a position of strength. But it could backfire, as well, and lead to a dilemma for the country because the Afghan government can retaliate,” he added.

Yousafzai said one way that the Afghan government could show its ability to hit back was by allowing the Pakistan Taliban a freer reign in the border areas.

“There is a lot of resentment within Afghanistan for what Pakistan did, and they are unhappy with the situation so this could have consequences,” he said.

Shah said Pakistan does have some leverage on Afghanistan: Pakistan is landlocked Afghanistan’s biggest trading partner. Pakistan has also long hosted millions of Afghan refugees. Many Afghans also travel to Pakistan to access health facilities.

Last year, following the surge in violence, Pakistan launched a drive to push Afghan refugees living in the country back to Afghanistan, citing security concerns.

The move was denounced, both domestically and globally, but more than half a million Afghans had been deported as of December 2023.

But if Pakistan uses any of those levers of influence, it is likely to end up even more unpopular in Afghanistan.

“There are strong anti-Pakistan sentiments in Afghanistan, and vice versa, and all of this isn’t going to help in the long-term for either of the two,” Yousafzai said.

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA

Barren Fields and Empty Stomachs: Afghanistan’s Long, Punishing Drought

March 19, 2024 Current News Articles

Text by Lynsey Addario and Victoria Kim

The New York Times

March 19, 2024

In a country especially vulnerable to climate change, a drought has displaced entire villages and left millions of children malnourished.

They awake in the mornings to find another family has left. Half of one village, the entirety of the next have departed in the years since the water dried up — in search of jobs, of food, of any means of survival. Those who remain pick apart the abandoned homes and burn the bits for firewood.

They speak of the lushness that once blessed this corner of southwestern Afghanistan. Now, it’s parched as far as the eye can see. Boats sit on bone-dry banks of sand. What paltry water dribbles out from deep beneath the arid earth is salt-laced, cracking their hands and leaving streaks in their clothes.

Several years of punishing drought has displaced entire swaths of Afghanistan, one of the nations most vulnerable to climate change, leaving millions of children malnourished and plunging already impoverished families into deeper desperation. And there is no relief in sight.

Reza Karimi, 28, left, and his cousin Khanjar Kuchai, 30, extracting wood and kindling last fall from relatives’ abandoned homes in Nimruz Province, in western Afghanistan.

In Noor Ali’s village in Chakhansur district, near the border with Iran, four families remain out of the 40 who once lived there. Mr. Ali, a 42-year-old father of eight who used to grow cantaloupes and wheat, in addition to raising cattle, goats and sheep, is too poor to leave. His family is subsisting on a dwindling 440-pound bag of flour, bought with a loan.

“I have no options. I am waiting for God,” he said. “I am hoping for water to come.”

The desperation in rural areas, where a majority of Afghanistan’s population lives, has forced families into impossible cycles of debt.

Rahmatullah Anwari, 30, who used to grow rain-dependent wheat, left his home in Badghis Province in the country’s north for an encampment that has sprung up on the outskirts of Herat, the capital of an adjacent province. He borrowed money to feed his family of eight and to pay for his father’s medical treatment. One of the villagers who had lent him money demanded his 8-year-old daughter in exchange for part of the loan.

“I have a hole in my heart when I think of them coming and taking my daughter,” he said.

Mohammed Khan Musazai, 40, had bought cattle on loan, but they were swept away in a flood — when rain comes, it comes erratically, and it has caused catastrophic flooding. The lenders took his land and also wanted his daughter, who was just 4 at the time.

Nazdana, a 25-year-old who is one of his two wives and is the girl’s mother, offered to sell her own kidney instead — an illegal practice that has become so common that some have taken to referring to the Herat encampment as the “one-kidney village.”

She has a fresh scar on her stomach from the kidney extraction, but the family’s debt is still only half paid.

“They asked me for this daughter, and I’m not going to give her,” she said. “My daughter is still very young. She still has a lot of hopes and dreams that she should realize.”

A few years ago, 30-year-old Khanjar Kuchai was thinking about going back to school or becoming a shepherd. He’d served in Afghanistan’s special forces, fighting alongside NATO troops. Now, he is figuring out survival a day at a time — on this day, he was salvaging wood from a relative’s abandoned home.

“They all left for Iran because there is no water,” he said. “Nobody was thinking that this water could dry up. It’s been two years like this.”

At Zooradin High School in Chakhansur, where the winds whip through the empty window frames, there has been no running water in the two years since the well ran dry. Students regularly fall ill from poor hygiene. The lack of rain, aid groups say, creates perfect conditions for waterborne diseases like cholera.

Mondo, a mother from Badghis who gave only her first name, has lost two of her children in the drought. She miscarried one child and lost another at just 3 months because the family had almost nothing to eat.

Her 9-month-old is always hungry, but she hasn’t been able to produce milk for some time. The large plots of land where her family once grew plentiful wheat, and occasionally poppy for opium, have long since gone barren.

“All day we are waiting to eat something,” she said. Surrounding her in a brightly painted free clinic run by Doctors Without Borders were other mothers clutching frail, famished babies.

With three-quarters of the country’s 34 provinces experiencing severe or catastrophic drought conditions, few corners of the country are untouched by the disaster.

In Jowzjan Province in northern Afghanistan, some who have solar panels have bored even deeper electric-powered wells and are now growing cotton, which can bring higher profits than other crops. But cotton consumes even more water.

“The Taliban came, and the drought came with them,” said Ghulam Nabi, 60, who is newly cultivating cotton.

Even after the years of drought, many speak as if they can still vividly see their land as it once was — green and plentiful, teeming with melons and cumin and wheat, river birds flitting overhead as fishing boats navigated through the waterways.

With little assistance from the Taliban authorities and international aid perennially falling far short, some say all they can do is trust that the water will someday return.

“We have these memories that these places were completely green,” says Suhrab Kashani, 29, a school principal. “We just pass the days and nights until the water comes.”

This project was supported by the National Geographic Society.

Pakistan’s Airstrikes In Khost, Paktika Spark Reactions

March 19, 2024 Current News Articles

Nazir Shinwari

Tolo News

19 March 2024

Former Afghan president Hamid Karzai, Naseer Ahmad Faiq and some other figures also condemned the Pakistani airstrikes on Khost and Paktika provinces.

Pakistani airstrikes in Afghan territory have provoked reactions from some countries as well as some prominent Afghan political figures.

Vedant Patel, deputy spokesperson for the US State Dept, said regarding these attacks that Afghanistan and Pakistan should resolve any disputes through dialogue.

“We urge both sides to address any differences. We remain committed to ensuring that Afghanistan never again becomes a safe haven for terrorists who wish to harm the United States and its allies,” he said at a press briefing.

“We urge Pakistan to exercise restraint and ensure civilians are not harmed in their counterterrorism efforts,” said Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House spokesperson.

Former Afghan president Hamid Karzai, Naseer Ahmad Faiq, Chargé d’Affaires of Afghanistan’s Permanent Mission to the UN, and some other figures also condemned the Pakistani airstrikes on Khost and Paktika provinces.

“Former President of Afghanistan, Hamid Karzai, has vehemently condemned the airstrikes by Pakistani military forces on areas in the provinces of Paktika and Khost, considering it a blatant violation of our country’s territorial integrity and international norms,” a statement from the office of Hamid Karzai reads.

“Pakistani military airstrikes on Afghan soil, under any pretext, are flagrant violations of international law and Afghanistan’s territorial integrity and sovereignty. Killing Afghan women and children is unacceptable and cannot justify any security threats,” said Nasir Ahmad Faiq wrote on social media.

“TTP has been present in Pakistan for at least fifteen years, they are operating there, they have their plans, they took many areas and the Pakistani army took them back, so it does not belong to the resumption of the Islamic Emirate,” Sayed Bilal Fatimi, a political analyst, told TOLOnews.

“It is not appropriate for both countries to invade each other’s territory, because this issue creates problems between both countries,” said Mohammad Uddin Mohammadi, another political analyst.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Islamic Emirate also said in a statement that the Chargé d’Affaires of the Pakistani Embassy was summoned in Kabul regarding recent airstrikes in Khost and Paktika provinces.

This comes as Pakistani fighters bombarded parts of Paktika and Khost provinces early Monday morning, resulting in the deaths of eight people, including children and women.

Political Ups and Downs for Islamic Emirate in 1402

March 19, 2024 Current News Articles

Mitra Majeedy

Tolo News

19 March 2024

This year, the number of diplomatic representations of Afghanistan engaged with the Islamic Emirate reached 38.

Although the Islamic Emirate was not officially recognized by the world in 1402, the caretaker government of Afghanistan expanded its interactions with some countries in the region and beyond.

According to the caretaker government, the number of political representatives of the Islamic Emirate in countries reached 38, and officials of the Islamic Emirate traveled to various countries around the world.

The world has always made the recognition of the Islamic Emirate conditional on: Respect for human rights, especially women’s rights, forming an inclusive government, starting a national dialogue, and counter-terrorism.

“We have not recognized them as a governing power in Afghanistan, they want legitimacy, but they need to meet their commitments. How can you effectively govern and how can you have an effective economy when basically half you workforce–all women–are prohibited from being part of that process? So we are going to keep holding them accountable for their commitments,” said John Kirby, US National Security Council spokesman, on the 12th of Mizan 1402 (October 04, 2023).

In response, the Islamic Emirate said some of the world’s conditions are internal issues of Afghanistan, and it has consistently emphasized that the world should not interfere in Afghanistan’s internal affairs. The Islamic Emirate has also made demands, including the recognition of the caretaker government, the release of the country’s foreign reserves, the expansion of diplomatic relations, and the lifting of sanctions on more than 15 officials of the Islamic Emirate.

“A country should have its boundaries, a nation, and an organization called the government, so they recognize it. What is considered interference is with ‘inclusivity’ and ‘non-inclusivity’ and the nature of the system,” Zabihullah Mujahid, spokesperson for the Islamic Emirate, said on the 16th of Jadi 1402 (January 06, 2024).

Officials of the Islamic Emirate traveled to some countries, including Pakistan, Qatar, Turkey, Iran, Turkmenistan, Russia, China, Kazakhstan, and Uzbekistan this year to improve relations with regional countries.

Amir Khan Muttaqi, the acting Minister of Foreign Affairs, traveled to Pakistan, Iran, Qatar, Russia, Turkmenistan, and Turkey in 1402, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the Deputy PM for Economic affairs, went to Iran in the month of Aqrab (October, 2023), and Mawlawi Mohammad Yaqoob Mujahid had a trip to Qatar in the month of Hoot (March, 2024).

“Diplomatic ties with numerous nations are very good and expanding day by day. The fact that Allah Almighty gave security to Afghanistan after 45 years means both Afghanistan itself and its neighbors now have security,” Amir Khan Muttaqi said on the 5th of Mizan 1402 (September 27, 2023).

Countries in the region, including China, Russia, Uzbekistan, and others, have always emphasized engagement with the interim government of Afghanistan.

“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 a major reason now for what we have seen happening … the destruction and suffering of Afghan people. The US and its allies have cut … aid, frozen Afghanistan’s overseas assets and imposed unilateral sanctions, worsening the suffering of Afghan people,” the Chinese special envoy for Afghanistan, Yue Xiaoyong said on 7th of Mizan 1402 (September 29, 2023).

“Pakistan believes that by engaging with the current authorities in Afghanistan, we can help bring peace to this country as well as prosperity and tranquility to the people of Afghanistan,” Asif Ali Durani, Pakistan’s special representative for Afghanistan, said on the 7th of Mizan 1402 (September 29, 2023) about his country’s stance towards Afghanistan.

This year, the number of diplomatic representations of Afghanistan engaged with the Islamic Emirate reached 38.

The Afghan embassies in the Netherlands and Spain engaged with the Islamic Emirate in the month of Mizan 1402 (September, 2023), the Afghan embassy in New Delhi announced the permanent cessation of its activities in the month of Aqrab (October, 2023); however, the General Consulate of Afghanistan in Hyderabad, India, announced the resumption of consular services of the Afghan embassy in New Delhi in the next month. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced the possibility of the reopening of the Azerbaijan embassy in the country in the month of Hoot (March,2023).

Meanwhile, China introduced Zhao Xing as its new ambassador to Afghanistan in the month of Sonbola 1402 (September, 2023), and Beijing accepted the credentials of Bilal Karimi as the ambassador from Afghanistan.

“Xi Jinping, president of China, while accepting the credentials of Bilal Karimi as ambassador and special representative of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, welcomed him as ambassador in China,” said Hafiz Zia Ahmad Takal, deputy spokesperson for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said on the 11th of Dalwa 1402 (January 30, 2024) about the acceptance of the Islamic Emirate’s ambassador in Beijing.

This matter led Washington to question the nature of China’s relationship with the Islamic Emirate.

“I think I would let the Chinese government speak to what this means in terms of their relationship and whether they have formally recognized the Taliban or not. I’ve seen some comments from them to the contrary,” Matthew Miller, spokesperson for the US Department of State, said on the 11th of Dalwa 1402 (January 31, 2024).

The relationship of the Islamic Emirate with the country’s eastern neighbor deteriorated due to accusations of terrorists using Afghan soil.

Khawaja Muhammad Asif, Pakistan’s minister of defense, said on the 27th of Hoot 1402 (March 18, 2024): “Parts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, which is on the border with Afghanistan — terrorists come to Pakistan from there (Afghanistan). We discussed the issue with the officials of the current government in Afghanistan and we know where the terrorists have shelters,” he said.

Meanwhile, the fate of the constitution and the official cabinet in 1402 remained unclear. The Islamic Emirate, upon returning to power in Afghanistan, suspended the 1382 constitution.

Nonetheless, Zabihullah Mujahid, spokesperson for the Islamic Emirate, told TOLOnews in the month of Hoot (March, 2024) that efforts to establish a constitution are underway and that the absence of a constitution does not mean that Afghanistan is in a legal vacuum. “We are not in a legal vacuum; Islamic Sharia is a very comprehensive law that specifies the duty of every individual in the government and the system,” he said.

Despite all this, 1402 ended while some issues including introduction of an official cabinet and the issue of a tricolor flag of the country remained unclear and it remains to be seen how these issues will be addressed in the coming year.

Generals who carried out Biden’s Afghan exit face new GOP scrutiny

March 19, 2024 Current News Articles

By Dan Lamothe, Abigail Hauslohner and Leigh Ann Caldwell

The Washington Post

March 19, 2024

The top two generals who oversaw the deadly evacuation of Afghanistan are facing renewed scrutiny Wednesday, as House Republicans escalate their campaign to hold President Biden accountable for the fiasco and Democrats accuse Donald Trump of having set the conditions for the Kabul government’s collapse.

Retired Gens. Mark A. Milley and Kenneth “Frank” McKenzie, career military officers who served in senior roles under both presidents, are testifying before the House Foreign Affairs Committee as part of its oversight investigation.

The U.S. departure from Afghanistan, marked by scenes of desperation and violence, continues to be a political challenge for Biden, who has defended his decision-making and blamed Trump for boxing him in by signing a deal with the Taliban that agreed to withdraw troops with few conditions.

Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Tex.), the committee chairman, has highlighted in the past that Milley, McKenzie and other senior defense officials recommended against the United States’ full withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021 but that Biden disregarded their advice. The congressman said at the hearing’s outset that his committee’s investigation has uncovered “repeated instances” of the White House “refusing to listen” to such warnings.

During a hearing in February, McCaul accused leaders at the White House and the State Department of having “stuck their heads in the sand” as it became increasingly clear that Afghanistan’s fall was imminent. Taliban fighters had overrun numerous cities and districts on their march to Kabul, facing nominal resistance from the Afghan security forces trained and subsidized by the U.S. government over 20 years.

Milley, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, is expected to discuss the timing for shuttering the U.S. Embassy in Afghanistan, a key tipping point in the crisis, said a person familiar with his thinking. A U.S. military investigation released in 2022 exposed profound frustration among numerous defense officials who detailed what they deemed a lack of urgency within the State Department despite clear evidence that security was crumbling.

Military personnel would have been “much better prepared to conduct a more orderly” evacuation, Navy Rear Adm. Peter Vasely, the top U.S. commander in Kabul during the operation, told Army investigators, “if policymakers had paid attention to the indicators of what was happening on the ground.”

Biden administration officials have fiercely disputed those characterizations, saying that while early parts of the evacuation were difficult, the U.S. government eventually stabilized security well enough to airlift 124,000 people from harm’s way. That was made possible in part by McKenzie, the former head of U.S. Central Command, striking a deal with the Taliban in which the militants would provide security outside the international airport in Kabul while U.S. forces manned the airfield’s perimeter.

Thousands of desperate civilians choked the streets around the facility in the days that followed as they sought to leave the country. The Taliban executed some of them, U.S. troops have said in interviews with military investigators and the media.

On Aug. 24, 2021, as the end of the evacuation neared, a suicide bomber later determined to be affiliated with the Islamic State detonated a bomb in a tightly packed outdoor corridor at the edge of the airport, killing 13 U.S. troops and an estimated 170 Afghans. Dozens more were wounded.

U.S. troops who survived the blast said they also came under gunfire, but U.S. military investigators found that the loss of life was linked to the single explosion. Military officials later agreed to review those findings and conduct additional witness interviews. The results are expected to be made public soon.

Pakistani Airstrikes in Afghanistan Kill at Least 8, Taliban Officials Say

March 18, 2024 Current News Articles

By Christina Goldbaum and Zia ur-Rehman

Christina Goldbaum reported from Kabul, Afghanistan; and Zia ur-Rehman from Karachi, Pakistan.

The New York Times

March 18, 2024, Updated 9:17 a.m. ET

Pakistan launched two airstrikes into Afghanistan on Monday morning that killed at least eight people, Afghan officials said, escalating simmering tensions between the two countries.

The pre-dawn strikes were carried out in the Paktika and Khost provinces in eastern Afghanistan around 3 a.m., Afghan officials said. Three children were among those killed, according to Taliban officials, who condemned the strikes as a violation of Afghan territory.

The strikes came amid a surge of attacks by militants in Pakistan following the Taliban’s seizure of power in neighboring Afghanistan. Pakistani officials have blamed militants harbored on Afghan soil and protected by the Taliban administration for the attacks. Taliban officials have denied those claims.

Zabihullah Mujahid, a spokesman for the Taliban administration, said in a statement on X that his country “has a long experience of freedom struggle against the superpowers of the world” and “does not allow anyone to invade its territory.”

“Such incidents can have very bad consequences which will be out of Pakistan’s control,” he added.

The Pakistani action came two days after militants attacked a military post in northwestern Pakistan, near the border with Afghanistan. In a statement released Monday evening, the Pakistani Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that the country had carried out “intelligence-based antiterrorist operations” inside Afghanistan and accused the Taliban administration of aiding militants operating in Pakistan.

Over the past two years, the statement said, the Pakistani government has “repeatedly urged the Afghan authorities to take concrete and effective action to ensure that the Afghan soil is not used as a staging ground for terrorism against Pakistan.”

“However, certain elements among those in power in Afghanistan are actively patronizing T.T.P. and using them as a proxy against Pakistan,” it added, referring to the Pakistani Taliban, also known as the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, or T.T.P.

The strikes and statement appeared to signal that Pakistan’s newly elected government would take a tough stance with the Taliban administration in Afghanistan over the militant violence that has roared back in Pakistan in recent years. That violence has shattered a relatively calm period since the country’s military carried out a large-scale military operation in 2014 and forced militants across the border into Afghanistan.

After the U.S.-backed government in Afghanistan collapsed in August 2021, the pace of attacks by militants surged in Pakistan, with the assaults themselves becoming bolder. In 2023, the number of attacks by militant groups in Pakistan rose by nearly 20 percent compared with the previous year, according to the Pak Institute for Peace Studies, which monitors extremist violence and is based in Islamabad, the Pakistani capital.

The violence has raised fears of a wider conflict breaking out along the historically contested border, known as the Durand Line, between Afghanistan and Pakistan. It has also fueled growing tensions between the Pakistani authorities and Taliban officials, who deny offering support to militant groups operating in Pakistan, including their ally, the Pakistani Taliban.

Pakistani officials have repeatedly asked the Taliban administration in Afghanistan to rein in the militants. In response, the Taliban authorities have suggested that Pakistan address the militants’ demands and have offered to mediate talks.

The Pakistani authorities’ frustration with the Taliban administration appeared to boil over in September, when the Pakistani government announced a policy aimed at expelling the more than half a million Afghans residing illegally in Pakistan.

The strikes on Monday appeared to send another message to the Taliban administration that Pakistan’s military and newly elected government would take a tougher stance on the militant violence.

The airstrikes sought to “dispel perceptions of a weak Pakistani state,” said Muhammad Amir Rana, head of the Pak Institute for Peace Studies. They also “reflect a unified counterterrorism policy between the new civilian government and the military,” he added.

While sporadic cross-border shelling from Pakistan frequently killed civilians in Afghanistan during the U.S.-led war, the strikes on Monday were the first that Pakistan had launched into Afghanistan in nearly two years. The last strikes, in April 2022, killed at least 45 people in the Khost and Kunar provinces of eastern Afghanistan.

The strikes on Monday were part of the military’s response to the attack on the military post on Saturday, a suicide blast that killed seven members of the Pakistani security forces, according to the Pakistani Ministry of Foreign Affairs. That attack also prompted the military to carry out an operation in the area and kill eight militants, according to a statement on Monday by the Inter-Services Public Relations office, the Pakistani military’s media arm.

Pakistani government officials promised an enduring response to the militants’ attack.

“Pakistan has decided that whoever enters our borders, homes or country to commit terror, we will respond to them strongly, regardless of their identity or country of origin,” President Asif Ali Zardari said while speaking at the funeral prayers for the army officers killed in the attack.

Safiullah Padshah contributed reporting from Kabul; and Salman Masood from Islamabad, Pakistan.

Christina Goldbaum is the Afghanistan and Pakistan bureau chief for The Times. More about Christina Goldbaum

Girls’ Despair Over Schools Reopening in Coming Academic Year

March 18, 2024 Current News Articles

TOLOnews

TV Network

18 March 2024

They said that due to the closure of schools, they have faced psychological problems and have lost hope.

As the new academic year 1403 (solar year) approaches, girls deprived of education in Herat are demanding the reopening of schools for students above grade six.

They said that due to the closure of schools, they have faced psychological problems and have lost hope.

Sharifa Ghiasi told TOLOnews that she was in grade seven when she was deprived of going to school and had to turn to tailoring out of necessity.

She added that she has been counting the days for the reopening of schools, but so far, her wish has not been fulfilled.

“It has been two years since the schools were closed, and we turned to tailoring. We request the Islamic Emirate to open the schools so that we can study and build a good future,” Sharifa told TOLOnews.

A number of girls deprived of education, who are engaged in tailoring alongside Sharifa, said that due to being deprived of education, they have turned to tailoring and vocational training out of necessity.

“We came here out of necessity because we were always at home, and now we have become busy with tailoring, and we want from the Islamic Emirate to reopen the schools,” said Hasanat Osmani, a deprived student.

“We were not allowed to go to school and had to turn to tailoring; we want to continue our studies,” said Nazanin Habibi, another student.

About 20 girls deprived of education are engaged to learn tailoring daily at different times in a tailoring workshop, and some of these girls have become tailors during the past two years.

“They come to us for work and training; these are girls deprived of education, they work here with their broken heart of their hopes because they are not interested in tailoring; they want to go to school, study, and to have a good future,” said Rana Ishaqzai, the head of the tailoring workshop.

More than 900 days have passed since the closure of schools for girls above grade six.

The Ministry of Education has always announced that the closure of girls’ schools is not permanent but temporary until further notice, but it is still unclear when the schools for girls above grade six will reopen.

Afghan Territory Used Against Pakistan: Pakistani Officials

March 18, 2024 Current News Articles

Nazir Shinwari

Tolo News

18 March 2024

Text by Lynsey Addario and Victoria Kim

Recent Posts