Thousands of Afghans flocked to the Kabul airport in a desperate bid to escape Afghanistan after the Taliban took control Aug. 15. Eighteen-month-old Farzad arrived with his parents, who handed him across the barbed wire to an American Marine. VOA’s Noshaba Ashna reports on the reunion of Farzad and his mother after 43 days, as well as her husband who is still hoping to flee Afghanistan.
Camera: Ajmal Sangaryar Producer: Noshaba Ashna
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The United States has berated the Taliban for what it said were misconstrued facts the Islamist group penned in a letter to the U.S. Congress this week regarding Afghanistan’s economic and humanitarian crisis. 

The Taliban published the so-called open letter on Wednesday, calling on U.S. lawmakers to unfreeze about $9.5 billion in Afghan foreign assets and end financial sanctions placed on Kabul after the Taliban takeover of the country in mid-August. 

The sanctions and disruption of international financial assistance have effectively collapsed the largely aid-dependent Afghan economy, wrote Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi. The new Taliban government has been unable to pay salaries to government employees and import essential goods.

Thomas West, the U.S. special representative for Afghanistan, said Friday in a tweeted statement that the South Asian nation was suffering a terrible humanitarian and economic crisis before the Taliban takeover, citing war, years of drought and the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic. 

West stressed that Washington had long made clear that critical nonhumanitarian foreign aid, including for basic services, would be ceased if the Taliban claimed power by military force rather than negotiating with the previous, U.S.-backed Afghan government.

“That is what occurred,” he said. 

“Legitimacy & support must be earned by actions to address terrorism, establish an inclusive government, & respect the rights of minorities, women & girls — including equal access to education & employment,” West’s tweeted statement continued. 

The envoy said the U.S. will continue to provide humanitarian aid to the Afghan people and has contributed $474 million this year. West added that efforts are also being made to help the United Nations and humanitarian actors to scale up to meet needs this winter. 

“We will continue clear-eyed, candid diplomacy with the Taliban,” he vowed. 

The U.S. administration has frozen the Afghan funds over human rights and terrorism concerns under the Taliban government, which is not recognized internationally. The Islamist group is also being asked to govern Afghanistan through an inclusive political system, where the rights of women and minorities are protected. 

In his letter, Muttaqi stopped short of placing the blame on the U.S. for the dire humanitarian and economic upheavals in his country, saying the sanctions “have not only played havoc” with trade and business but also with relief aid to millions of desperate Afghans.

The Taliban’s chief diplomat said the biggest challenge facing the country was financial insecurity, warning the economic turmoil could trigger a mass refugee exodus from Afghanistan and lead to trouble for the world. 

On Friday, the U.N. Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) said Afghanistan needs urgent large-scale agricultural assistance to avoid a “hunger trap” stemming from widespread drought, collapse of rural livelihoods and unprecedented economic challenges. 

An FAO statement said at least 18.8 million in the war-torn country are unable to feed themselves on a daily basis, and the number is projected to rise to nearly 23 million by the end of next month. 

“We need to help Afghanistan avoid a hunger trap. Millions of Afghans are living on the edge of catastrophe,” said FAO Director-General Qu Dongyu. “Urgent investment in agriculture and livestock production is needed now, and it helps donors to save money down the road by putting the country back on track to food security.” 
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Pakistan says it has removed a clause from a new anti-rape law that had allowed for the chemical castration of repeat rapists. 

Prime Minister Imran Khan’s government confirmed the decision two days after the ruling coalition hurriedly approved 33 legislative bills, including the anti-rape law, in a joint session of the parliament on Wednesday, amid furious protests by opposition lawmakers. 

“The Islamic Council of Ideology had objected to the punishment of chemical castration for rapists for being an un-Islamic practice, so we decided to remove it from the law,” Maleeka Bukhari, parliamentary secretary on law, told reporters Friday in Islamabad. 

The council is a constitutional advisory body mandated to interpret and ensure all Pakistani laws are in line with Islam.

The new anti-rape law would allow for speedy convictions and severe sentences for perpetrators, including the death penalty. The legislation requires the government to establish special courts across Pakistan to try rape cases in secrecy and decide them “expeditiously, preferably within four months.”

Under the law, a nationwide register of sex offenders will also be maintained with the help of the National Database and Registration Authority. The identity of victims will be protected and special “anti-rape crisis cells” will be formed to conduct medical examinations of victims within hours of the crime. 

Those found guilty of gang rape will be sentenced to death or imprisoned for the rest of their life. 

The new law is a response to a public outcry against a recent surge in incidents of rape of women and children in Pakistan and growing demands for effectively stemming the crime. 

Khan proposed last year in repeated public statements that he wanted to introduce chemical castration to stem sexual offenses. The prime minister’s remarks came amid a national outcry stemming from the September 2020 assault on a woman, who was dragged out of her car and raped by two men at gunpoint in front of her children, when her car was stalled on the side of the road. 

Chemical castration, a forced medical treatment designed to reduce sex drive, is carried out by the use of drugs and is a reversible process. The punishment is practiced in countries such as Poland, South Korea, the Czech Republic and some U.S. states. 

While some research indicates the procedure can reduce recidivism, critics call it inhumane and ineffective. 

Amnesty International, while responding to the reported approval of the chemical castration by Pakistan, said Thursday the “cruel and inhuman” legislation violated the country’s international and constitutional legal obligations. 

“Rather than ratcheting up punishments, the authorities should address the deep-seated problems in the criminal justice system that invariably deny justice to victims. Chemical castrations will not solve a deficient police force or inadequately trained investigators,” the human rights group said.

Critics say fewer than 4% of sexual assault or rape cases in Pakistan result in a conviction. 

Legal experts say rape cases in Pakistan take years to prosecute and rapists often escape punishment because political influence leads to faulty police investigations. Moreover, rampant corruption in the lower judiciary can help rapists in seeking favorable verdicts. 

The circumstances often discourage women from seeking justice for fear of being shamed or persecuted by police or even their own relatives in the largely conservative Pakistani society. 
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Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said Friday his government will scrap three controversial farm laws that prompted the biggest protest against his government since he took power seven years ago and emerged as a significant political challenge.

Modi’s unexpected announcement in a televised address to the nation is seen as a major reversal by the government, which had repeatedly defended the laws. It came ahead of crucial regional elections in several states including two — Uttar Pradesh and Punjab – whose farmers have been at the forefront of the protests.

“We have decided to repeal all three farm laws and will begin the procedure at the Parliament session that begins this month,” Modi said. He said it was important that “we have not been able to convince the benefits of these laws to all farmers.”

“I hope the protesting farmers will now return to their homes, return to their farms, and we can start afresh,” he said.

Tens of thousands of farmers from North India have blocked highways around the capital, New Delhi, for a year vowing to stay until the laws that opened the sale of farm produce to the private sector were repealed. Fearing that big corporations would drive down prices and threaten their livelihood, they led one of the biggest mobilizations witnessed in India.

Modi made his address on the day of a Sikh festival, Guru Purab. Many of the protesters on highways were Sikh farmers from Punjab.

His announcement led to a wave of celebrations among farmers, who distributed sweets at the highways where they are camped and shouted slogans of “Long live farmers unity.”

A group of farm unions that has led the yearlong campaign welcomed the move but said the protest would only be ended after the laws are repealed in Parliament when it convenes.

“If this happens, it will be a historic victory of the one-year-long farmers’ struggle in India,” the Samyukt Kisan Morcha said in a statement.

The government said that opening the sale of farm produce to the private sector would help to improve rural incomes that have been declining. The government currently buys 23 crops, including rice and wheat, at a guaranteed price from farmers.

Farmers, many of whom own tiny plots of land of less than a hectare, however, feared that the entry of the private sector would drive down prices, and often pointed to states whose farmers had suffered when the government stopped buying their crops.

Their protest has been mostly peaceful, but violence broke out in January when some farmers stormed through police barricades during a march on India’s Republic Day.

Some political observers saw the decision to back down from the laws as “damage control” in a country where farmers form a significant voting bloc – nearly half of its 1.3 billion people depend on the farm sector.

“The elections in Uttar Pradesh early next year are crucial for the Bharatiya Janata Party and they feared loss of political support,” said Neerja Chowdhury, an independent political analyst. “Mr. Modi usually never backs down, but he is also quick to course correct. When he is in a weak position, he is flexible.”

While several economists have said the farm laws were necessary to modernize India’s agriculture and draw in private investment, others said the farmers’ concerns were genuine. Among them is farm economist Devinder Sharma, who said that although the laws’ repeal represents a significant victory for farmers, the battle is “only half-won.”

He said the protest has turned the spotlight on what he calls widespread agrarian distress in the country.

“Mr. Modi said that they were not able to convince the farmers. Actually, they were not able to understand their problem,” according to Sharma. “Farm incomes have either been falling or have been static. This is what needs urgent attention.”

The farmers’ unions indicated that they would press for their second major demand, a separate law guaranteeing a minimum price for crops.

“The agitation of farmers is not just for the repeal of the three black laws, but also for a statutory guarantee to remunerative prices for all agricultural produce and for all farmers. This important demand of farmers is still pending,” it said.

Opposition parties, who had supported the protests, welcomed the government’s decision.

Rahul Gandhi, leader of the Congress Party, tweeted, “The country’s farmers, through their resistance, made arrogance bow its head.”

 
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More than 28,000 Afghans have applied for temporary admission into the U.S. for humanitarian reasons since shortly before the Taliban recaptured Afghanistan and sparked a chaotic U.S. withdrawal, but only about 100 of them have been approved, according to federal officials.

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services has struggled to keep up with the surge in applicants to a little-used program known as humanitarian parole but promises it’s ramping up staff to address the growing backlog.

Afghan families in the U.S. and the immigrant groups supporting them say the slow pace of approvals threatens the safety of their loved ones, who face an uncertain future under the repressive Islamist regime because of their ties to the West.

“We’re worried for their lives,” says Safi, a Massachusetts resident whose family is sponsoring 21 relatives seeking humanitarian parole. “Sometimes, I think there will be a day when I wake up and receive a call saying that they’re no more.”

The 38-year-old U.S. permanent resident, who asked that her last name not be used for fear of retribution against her relatives, is hoping to bring over her sister, her uncle and their families. She says the families have been in hiding and their house was destroyed in a recent bombing because her uncle had been a prominent local official before the Taliban took over.

The slow pace of approvals is frustrating because families have already paid hundreds if not thousands of dollars in processing fees, says Chiara St. Pierre, an attorney at the International Institute of New England in Lowell, Massachusetts, a refugee resettlement agency assisting Safi’s family.

Each parole application comes with a $575 filing charge, meaning USCIS, which is primarily fee-funded, is sitting on some $11.5 million from Afghans in the last few months alone, she and other advocates complain.

“People are desperate to get their families out,” said St. Pierre, whose nonprofit has filed more than 50 parole applications for Afghan nationals. “Do we not owe a duty to the people left behind, especially when they are following our immigration laws and using the options they have?”

Victoria Palmer, a USCIS spokesperson, said the agency has trained 44 additional staff to help address the application surge. As of mid-October, the agency had only six staffers detailed to the program.

Of the more than 100 approved as of July 1, some are still in Afghanistan and some have made it to third countries, she said, declining to provide details. The program typically receives fewer than 2,000 requests annually from all nationalities, of which USCIS approves an average of about 500, according to Palmer.

Part of the challenge is that humanitarian parole requires an in-person interview, meaning those in Afghanistan need to travel to another county with an operating U.S. embassy or consulate after they’ve cleared the initial screening. U.S. officials warn it could then take months longer, and there’s no guarantee parole will be granted, even after the interview.

Humanitarian parole doesn’t provide a path to lawful permanent residence or confer U.S. immigration status. It’s meant for foreigners who are unable to go through the asylum or other traditional visa processes, but who need to leave their country urgently.

The backlog of parole requests comes on top of the more than 73,000 Afghan refugees already evacuated from the country as part of Operations Allies Welcome, which was focused on Afghans who worked for the U.S. government as interpreters and in other jobs.

Most have arrived in the country and have been staying on military bases awaiting resettlement in communities across the country, though about 2,000 still remain overseas awaiting clearance to enter the U.S., according to Palmer.

But advocates question some of USCIS’s recent decisions for Afghan humanitarian parole, such as prioritizing applications from those already living in other countries. They say that approach is at odds with the program’s purpose of helping those most at risk.

The Biden administration should instead focus on applications from women and girls, LGBTQ people and religious minorities still in the country, said Sunil Varghese, of the New York-based International Refugee Assistance Project.

It could also dispense with some of the financial documentation required for applicants and their sponsors, since Congress has passed legislation making Afghan evacuees eligible for refugee benefits, said Lindsay Gray, CEO of Vecina, an Austin, Texas-based group that trains attorneys and volunteers on immigration matters.

Palmer didn’t directly address the critiques but said the agency, in each case, determines if there’s a “distinct, well-documented reason” to approve humanitarian parole and whether other protections are available. USCIS also considers whether the person already has U.S. ties, such as a family member with legal status or prior work for the U.S. government, among other factors.

In the meantime, Afghans in the U.S. have little choice but to wait and fret.

Bahara, another Afghan living in Massachusetts who asked her last name be withheld over concerns for her family, says she’s been wracked with guilt for her decision to leave her country to attend a local university.

The 29-year-old boarded a plane Aug. 15 just hours before the Taliban swept into the capital of Kabul, leading to one of the largest mass evacuations in U.S. history.

“It was my dream, but it changed completely,” said Bahara, referring to enrolling in a U.S. master’s degree program. “I couldn’t stop thinking about my family. I couldn’t sleep the first few weeks. All I did was cry, but it didn’t help.”

Bahara said her family is worried because Taliban officials have been paying unannounced visits to people like her father who worked with the U.S. government after the militant group was originally ousted from power by the U.S. following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

An American family is now sponsoring her family for humanitarian parole, giving Bahara hope even as she grieves over her country’s current situation.

“I cannot believe how everything just collapsed,” said Bahara, who founded a children’s literacy program in Afghanistan. “All the achievements and hard work just added up to zero, and now people are suffering.”

Baktash Sharifi Baki, a green-card holder who has been living in the U.S. since 2014, was compelled to take more drastic measures as Afghanistan quickly unraveled this summer.

The Philadelphia resident, who served as an interpreter for the U.S. government, traveled back in August in the hopes of shepherding his wife, daughter, mother and godson to safety.

But the family wasn’t able to board any of the final commercial flights out of Kabul. Baki has appealed to the U.S. government to allow them to board one of the charter flights that have recently resumed.

Meanwhile, a friend in Louisiana has offered to serve as the family’s sponsor for a humanitarian parole application, even covering the costly fees himself.

Baki and his family are staying for now with relatives in the northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif. But he worries his modest cash savings is dwindling just as the region’s harsh winter sets in and Afghanistan’s economic crisis is deepening.

“We are really facing a bad situation here,” Baki said. “We need to get out.” 

 
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Members of Afghanistan’s women’s youth development soccer team arrived in Britain early Thursday after being flown from Pakistan with the help of a New York rabbi, a U.K. soccer club and Kim Kardashian West.

A plane chartered by the reality star and carrying more than 30 teenage players and their families, about 130 people in all, landed at Stansted Airport near London. The Afghans will spend 10 days in coronavirus quarantine before starting new lives in Britain.

English Premier League club Leeds United has offered to support the players.

Britain and other countries evacuated thousands of Afghans in a rushed airlift as Kabul fell to Taliban militants in August. Many more people have since left overland for neighboring countries in hopes of traveling on to the West.

Women playing sports was seen as a political act of defiance against the Taliban, and hundreds of female athletes have left Afghanistan since the group returned to power and began curbing women’s education and freedoms.

Khalida Popal, a former captain of Afghanistan’s national women’s team who has spearheaded evacuation efforts for female athletes, said she felt “so happy and so relieved” that the girls and women were out of danger.

“Many of those families left their houses when the Taliban took over. Their houses were burnt down,” Popal told the Associated Press. “Some of their family members were killed or taken by Taliban. So the danger and the stress was very high, and that’s why it was very important to move fast to get them outside Afghanistan.”

Australia evacuated the members of Afghanistan’s national women’s soccer team, and the youth girls’ team was resettled in Portugal.  

Members of the development team, many of whom come from poor families in the country’s provinces, managed to reach Pakistan and eventually to secure U.K. visas. But they were left in limbo for weeks with no flight out of the country as the time limit on their Pakistani visas ticked down.

The team got help from the Tzedek Association, a nonprofit U.S. group that previously helped the last known member of Kabul’s Jewish community leave Afghanistan.

The group’s founder, Rabbi Moshe Margaretten, has worked with reality TV star Kardashian West on criminal justice reform in the U.S. He reached out to her to help pay for a chartered plane to the U.K.

“Maybe an hour later, after the Zoom call, I got a text message that Kim wants to fund the entire flight,” Margaretten said.

Kardashian West’s spokeswoman confirmed that the star and her brand SKIMs had chartered the flight.
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For girls in Pakistan getting an education can be more difficult because schools are often located far from home. VOA’s Muhammad Saqib brings us the story of a teacher who is trying to help her students solve that problem. Bezhan Hamdard narrates.
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Police in Indian-controlled Kashmir on Wednesday detained relatives of two civilians killed in a controversial gunfight after the families staged a protest in Srinagar demanding that local police return the bodies for traditional burial. 

The two civilians were among four people killed in a shootout with government security forces in Indian-administered Kashmir earlier this week, and their families have accused those troops of lying about how the raid unfolded. 

Police say the civilians died in the crossfire between government troops and rebels. But witnesses and families of the civilians say Indian troops used those civilians as human shields during the standoff. 

On Tuesday, police in the disputed region’s main city said that four people were killed in the raid.   

The fight, according to police, left dead a foreign “terrorist,” Hyder — whose alias, according to police, is Bilal Bhai — along with his “associate,” Aamir Ahmad, and “two sympathizers,” Mudasir Gul and Altaf Ahmad Bhat.   

Vijay Kumar, police inspector general for the Muslim-majority Kashmir region, told reporters that police had information about the presence of militants in the area. 

“The joint teams of police, central reserve police force and army set up a cordon and searched,” he said, adding that when government forces knocked on the door of a room where the militants were hiding, militants shot at them, and in “self-defense, troops opened fire.” 

The gunfight took place inside a three-story shopping center owned by Bhat, who sold cement and hardware on the ground floor. Gul rented the first floor, where he operated a construction business and a call center where he employed Ahmad as a helper. 

‘Gunfight was staged’   

“I believe the gunfight was staged,” eyewitness Mohammad Shafi told VOA. “Police have constantly changed their statements.”   

Shafi disputed the police claim of killing four people, including a foreign militant. 

“Following the gunfight, I saw only three bodies being taken out from the building before leaving the spot,” he said. “I wonder, who was the fourth one?” 

Another eyewitness, who requested anonymity for fear of retaliation, said he knew the three people killed, especially Bhat, who was a “classmate and neighbor.” He believes all three were innocent civilians.   

The eyewitness told VOA that police first rounded up everyone on the premises and led them to a nearby showroom.   

“Then a few policemen asked [Bhat] and [Gul] to accompany them inside Bhat’s building, and they obeyed,” he said. 

Police went inside and came back out multiple times before taking Gul’s worker Ahmad inside as well.   

Soon after, bystanders heard gunshots. 

A picture of Bhat’s bloodied body started circulating on local Facebook pages. Later, police tweeted that militants had been killed in the encounter.

‘Human shield’ 

Journalist Saima Bhat, Bhat’s niece, accused police of using her uncle as a human shield. 

“You killed my innocent uncle Mohammad Altaf Bhat in cold-blooded murder in Hyderpora [neighborhood], you used him as human shield and now saying he was ‘OGW.’ Return us his body,” she tweeted, using an acronym for “over ground workers,” a regional colloquialism for people who provide logistical support to militants or terrorists.

Bhat’s brother Abdul Majeed told VOA the authorities have falsely accused his brother of supporting militancy. 

“I challenge the inspector general of police to prove that my brother was an OGW,” Majeed said with tears in his eyes before criticizing police for risking the lives of ordinary citizens by including them in search operations.   

“If [police and army] had information about the presence of militants, they should conduct their own searches without risking innocent lives,” he said.   

According to Majeed, Ahmad was a poor worker who did odd jobs for Gul. 

“The first time government forces entered inside the building, they frisked [Ahmad] and asked him to wait downstairs,” Majeed said. “Had he been a militant, they would have nabbed him right then.” 

‘At least return his body’ 

Gul, the third person killed in the fight, was a physician who had switched to the construction business. Police labelled him a “white-collar terrorist,” but his family and friends called his killing “cold-blooded murder.”   

Gul’s father, Ghulam Mohammad Rather, is calling for a judicial probe.   

“My son had nothing to do with any militant organization,” he said. “At least return his body so we can perform his last rites.”   

One of Gul’s friends alleged that the police were “cooking up something” because they kept changing their statement. 

Police account 

Inspector Kumar says police approached the families of Gul and Bhat about participating in the burial. 

“Since we have apprehensions of law-and-order problems, we cannot hand over bodies to families,” he said. “We took bodies to Handwara — some 90 kilometers from Srinagar — where burial took place.” 

In a statement, police said that two pistols were recovered from the site of the encounter, and that the call center in Bhat’s building had been used for terrorist activities.   

Police initially said both Bhat and Gul were injured and eventually killed by “terrorists firing,” but later said that both men may have been caught in the crossfire between the alleged militants and police. 

“I’m saying [Bhat] was killed in cross-firing,” Kumar said. “I’m not saying if he was killed by militants or if we fired at him. During the encounter, whose bullet hit him is a matter of investigation. If he was hit by a pistol bullet, then terrorists have killed him; if hit by AK rifle, then we can say he was hit by our bullet.” 

Demand for independent inquiry   

The incident has sparked outrage across the valley, and various political parties have condemned it.   

The former chief minister of Kashmir, Mehbooba Mufti, accused the Indian government of atrocities.   

“Using innocent civilians as human shields, getting them killed in cross firing & then conveniently labelling them as OGWs is part of [the government of India’s] rulebook now,” Mufti tweeted. “Imperative that a credible judicial enquiry is done to bring out the truth & put an end to this rampant culture of impunity.” 
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The United Nations top diplomat in Afghanistan urged the international community on Wednesday to pay greater attention to the rise of the so-called Islamic State in Afghanistan, saying the terror group is taking advantage of continuing instability to expand its presence in the country.

“Once limited to a few provinces and Kabul, ISIL-KP now seems to be present in nearly all provinces and increasingly active,” U.N. envoy Deborah Lyons told a meeting of the U.N. Security Council, using an acronym for the Islamic State Khorasan Province.

She said attacks are up significantly — 334 this year, compared with 60 in 2020, all attributed to or claimed by IS Khorasan. Many of the attacks have targeted Shiites.

“The Taliban insist that they are waging a concerted campaign against ISIL-KP, but this campaign is worrying as it appears to rely heavily on extrajudicial detentions and killings of suspected ISIL-KP members,” Lyons said. “This is an area deserving of more attention from the international community.”

The terror group has intensified bombings and other attacks since the Taliban seized power in mid-August.

U.S. military officials have been warning for months that there is a danger of IS Khorasan and al-Qaida regrouping and reemerging in a weakened Afghanistan.

On engagement with the Taliban, Lyons said it has been “generally useful and constructive” and that the Taliban have assured the United Nations that they want it to stay and assist the population.

‘Humanitarian catastrophe’

Afghanistan was in a humanitarian crisis before the government fell to the Taliban. Years of conflict, drought and corruption had left millions in poverty and displaced.

With the economy dependent on foreign development aid, which has been largely suspended while the international community assesses whether the Taliban can be a reliable partner, the humanitarian situation has steadily unraveled and the U.N. says 23 million people in a country of 38 million need some form of assistance.

“We are on the brink of a humanitarian catastrophe, but we are on the brink of a humanitarian catastrophe that is preventable,” Lyons said.

While she did not explicitly call for the lifting of international sanctions or the unfreezing of funds, she pointed to their role in the gradual economic collapse.

“An entire complex social and economic system is shutting down, in part due to the asset freeze, the suspension of non-humanitarian aid flows, and sanctions,” the U.N. envoy said.

Russia and China urged the unfreezing of Afghanistan’s internationally held cash.

“The frozen Afghan assets should be returned to the true owners as soon as possible, and cannot be used as bargaining chip or threat or for coercion,” China’s U.N. envoy Zhang Jun said.

US aid

The United States, which completed its withdrawal from the country in August, has contributed $474 million this year in humanitarian assistance.

“And although we and many others are rightly seized with Afghanistan’s humanitarian needs, we continue to pay close attention to whether the Taliban is demonstrating compliance with its commitments on counterterrorism, respect for human rights, and inclusivity,” U.S. Ambassador Jeffrey DeLaurentis told the council.

The Taliban government has not won any formal international recognition, and it is still represented at the United Nations by the previous government’s envoy.

“The situation in Afghanistan is extremely fragile,” Ambassador Ghulam Isaczai said. “It is only through an inclusive government we can safeguard against a new civil war along ethnic lines and the use of Afghan territory by foreign terrorist outfit, as well as making a transition from a perpetual state of humanitarian crisis to a more stable economy.”

He expressed support for reviving the Doha peace process and the holding of an international peace conference.

On the humanitarian situation, he appealed for generous international support, but stressed funding should not go directly to the Taliban.

Iran, Tajikistan and Pakistan also addressed the council as concerned neighbors.

Pakistan, which has had a warm relationship with the Taliban, said the new authorities are “responding positively” to engagement with the international community.

“The nightmare scenarios that were feared after 15 August have not come to pass,” Ambassador Munir Akram told the council. “There has been no widespread violence or violations of human rights in Afghanistan.”

He said the security situation is “vastly improved” and girls schools are open except for secondary schools. He said the Taliban say that is because of a lack of teachers and their inability to find the cash to pay them.

“The glass may yet be half full, yet engagement has yielded progress,” Akram said.

The Pakistani diplomat also took a swipe at his Afghan counterpart, saying the council might benefit more from “hearing from those actually ruling Kabul.” 
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Lawmakers in Pakistan approved on Wednesday new anti-rape legislation that would allow speedy convictions and severe sentences, including chemical castration, for rapists.

The bill is a response to a public outcry against a recent surge in incidents of rape of women and children in the country and growing demands for effectively stemming the crime.

The government will be required to establish special courts across Pakistan to expedite trials of rape suspects and decide cases of sexual abuse “expeditiously, preferably within four months.”

Under the bill, a nationwide register of sex offenders will also be maintained with the help of the National Database and Registration Authority. The identity of victims will be protected and special “anti-rape crisis cells” will be formed to conduct medical examinations of victims within hours of the crimes.

Those found guilty of gang rape will be sentenced to death or imprisoned for the rest of their lives, and repeat offenders could be subjected to chemical castration.

Critics say fewer than 4% of sexual assault or rape cases in Pakistan result in a conviction.

Rights activists welcomed the legislation but stressed the need for improved policing and prosecution to ensure justice for victims of sexual violence.

Legal experts say that rape cases in Pakistan take years to prosecute and that rapists often escape punishment because political influence leads to faulty police investigations. Moreover, rampant corruption in the lower judiciary can also help rapists in seeking favorable verdicts.

The circumstances often discourage women from seeking justice for fear of being shamed or persecuted by police or even their own relatives in the largely conservative Pakistani society.

Electronic voting

Pakistan’s parliament also passed a set of other bills Wednesday allowing electronic voting and granting for first-time expatriate Pakistanis the right to vote in national elections.

All the bills approved will come into force once signed by President Arif Alvi, which is a formality.

Opposition parties in the parliament furiously opposed the electronic voting bill, accusing Prime Minister Imran Khan’s government of paving the ground for rigging in the next elections due in 2023.

Ruling party lawmakers rejected charges that the bill was politically motivated and defended the electronic voting bill, saying it would ensure free and fair elections in Pakistan.

Khan took office in 2018 and has been calling for reforming the country’s decades-old election system that features paper ballots and manual vote-counting, leading to allegations of widespread rigging in all previous polls.
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Dozens of Armenian soldiers have been captured or gone missing following the latest clashes on the border with Azerbaijan, officials in Yerevan said on November 17.

Meanwhile, Azerbaijan’s Defense Ministry said on the morning of November 17 that seven of its soldiers were killed and 10 others wounded in renewed fighting on the shared border that erupted on November 16.

According to a statement by Armenia’s Defense Ministry, 13 Armenian soldiers were captured by Azerbaijani forces and another 24 Armenian servicemen have gone missing and that their fate remains unknown.

The statement added that one Armenian soldier was killed in the fighting, which Yerevan says has stopped following talks with Moscow.

Both sides blamed each other for starting the latest conflict amid tensions between the two former Soviet nations that have simmered since a six-week war last year over Nagorno-Karabakh.

Azerbaijan said its forces prevented “large-scale provocations” by Armenian forces in the Kalbacar and Lachin districts bordering Armenia.

In turn, Armenia’s Defense Ministry accused Azerbaijani soldiers of shooting at its positions along the border, using artillery, armored vehicles, and guns.

Later on November 16, Russia’s Defense Ministry reported that hostilities on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border had ceased after a cease-fire was reached with Moscow’s mediation. Armenia confirmed that report.

The situation along the border has been tense since the two South Caucasus nations fought a 44-day war over Nagorno-Karabakh last year that killed at least 6,500 people and ended with a cease-fire that granted Azerbaijan control of parts of the region as well as adjacent territories occupied by Armenians.

The breakaway region is internationally recognized as part of Azerbaijan but had been under the control of ethnic Armenian forces backed by Armenia since the end of a separatist war in 1994.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that Washington was “troubled” by the reports of the fighting. In a tweet on November 17, Blinken called on both sides to engage “directly and constructively to resolve all outstanding issues, including border demarcation.”

On November 16, the European Union also urged the two sides to show restraint.

Calling for “urgent de-escalation and [a] full cease-fire,” the president of the European Council, Charles Michel, described the situation in the region as “challenging.”

“The EU is committed to work with partners to overcome tensions for a prosperous and stable South Caucasus,” Michel wrote on Twitter.

Some information for this story came from the Associated Press.
…

The Taliban foreign minister Wednesday penned an “open letter” to the U.S. Congress, warning of a mass refugee exodus from Afghanistan unless the United States unblocks more than $9 billion in Afghan central bank assets and ends other financial sanctions against the country.

Amir Khan Muttaqi wrote that the sanctions “have not only played havoc” with trade and business but also with humanitarian aid to millions of desperate Afghans. Muttaqi’s office in Kabul released copies of the letter in several languages, including English.

Muttaqi maintained that his government has managed to bring political stability and security to Afghanistan since returning to power last August but growing economic troubles are worsening humanitarian challenges.

“Currently the fundamental challenge of our people is financial security and the roots of this concern lead back to the freezing of assets of our people by the American government,” said the Taliban’s chief diplomat.

“We are concerned that if the current situation prevails, the Afghan government and people will face problems and will become a cause for mass migration in the region and world,” Muttaqi said.

Last week, the Norwegian Refugee Council reported that around 300,000 Afghans have fled to Iran since August and up to 5,000 continue to illegally cross the border into the neighboring country daily.

Washington and Europe have blocked Kabul’s access to more than $9 billion in Afghan central bank assets largely held in the U.S. Federal Reserve after the Islamist Taliban takeover in Afghanistan last August.

The World Bank and International Monitory Fund also have suspended about $1.2 billion in aid money they were supposed to release for Afghanistan this year. 

“We hope that the members of the American Congress will think thoroughly in this regard and the American officials will view from [the] prism of justice the problems of our people arising from sanctions and unjust partisan treatment, and not approach this humanitarian issue in a superficial manner,” Muttaqi said.

The Taliban are struggling to pay doctors, teachers and other government employees. The international sanctions have also made it challenging for the United Nations and other aid groups to pay their staff and sustain Afghan relief operations.

The U.S. administration has frozen the Afghan money over human rights and terrorism concerns under Taliban rule. The Islamist group is also being pressed to govern the country through an inclusive political system, where the rights of Afghan women and minorities are protected.

The U.N. World Food Program has warned that years of conflict, and a prolonged drought, threaten more than half of the country’s estimated population of 40 million people with starvation this winter.

The Taliban issued the letter ahead of Wednesday’s debate in the United Nations Security Council on the unfolding humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan and ways to address it.

No country has so far recognized the Taliban as the legitimate government in Kabul. But the unfolding Afghan humanitarian crisis has prompted all major powers, including the U.S., to remain in touch with the new rulers to ensure delivery of urgently needed aid to millions of Afghans to prevent a humanitarian catastrophe.

Analyst Torek Farhadi, a former Afghan official, said Muttaqi’s letter fell short of what Kabul will do in the face of U.S. conditions set for granting the Taliban much-needed diplomatic recognition.

Farhadi cautioned the Taliban would be locked in an unending “war of logic with the world” unless they address international concerns.

“From a diplomatic standpoint, to show a positive development, new appointments need to occur in the [acting] government in Kabul. The world needs concrete changes in governance. Steps that are needed to give the U.S. and the world a solid argument for recognition,” he said.

Afghanistan was isolated under the previous Taliban rule from 1996 to 2001 for human rights abuses, including barring women from leaving home unaccompanied and girls from receiving an education.

Since their return to power in August, the Taliban have been repeatedly pledging that they intend to do things differently this time, although girls are still barred from returning to secondary school in most provinces.

The United States risks further damaging its reputation in Afghanistan “and this will serve as the worst memory ingrained in Afghans at the hands of America,” Muttaqi said.

“I request the government of the United States of America take responsible steps…so that doors for future relations are opened, assets of Afghanistan’s Central Bank are unfrozen and sanctions on our banks are lifted.”
…

With the Indian capital enveloped in a haze of toxic smog, authorities ordered six thermal plants in the city’s vicinity to shut temporarily, closed schools and colleges indefinitely and imposed work-from-home restrictions to control pollution levels that turned severe on several days this month.

A panel of the federal environment ministry has also banned construction activity until the end of the week and barred trucks, except those carrying essential commodities, from entering the city as part of the series of emergency measures.

Environmentalists pointed out that these steps would only marginally mitigate the air pollution crisis that grips New Delhi every winter.

“The emergency action is not a magic bullet that will address the pollution crisis,” said Anumita Rowchowdhury, executive director research and advocacy at New Delhi’s Center for Science and Environment. “It only ensures that it will not worsen the pollution but it will not clean the air.”

The world’s most polluted capital city has recorded levels for dangerous particles known as PM 2.5 that settle deep inside lungs many times higher than the standards set by the World Health Organization.

The haze that covers the city is a mix of fumes, including vehicular emissions, industrial pollution, construction dust, farm fires and fumes caused by the burning of waste in the open. In winter, the pollutants hang over the city due to low wind speeds.

City authorities in Delhi have told the Supreme Court they are considering a weekend lockdown, similar to what was implemented during the pandemic. If so, it would be the first of a kind “pollution” lockdown.

The toxic smog is not restricted to the capital city — skies across much of North India also turn grey at this time of the year leaving millions gasping for air.

But while Delhi has taken some steps to combat the dirty air by shutting down coal-fired power stations and switching most industry and public transport to clean fuel, the same standards have not been imposed by neighboring states, experts point out.

“Air does not respect political boundaries. The time has come to take a regional approach and scale up stringent action in the entire Indo-Gangetic plains,” said Roychowdhury. “For example, Delhi is the only city to have switched industry to natural gas, imposed clean fuel standards for vehicles and shut down coal plants. But the same needs to be done elsewhere. We really need to ramp up our energy transition.”

However, phasing out coal, which still powers 70% of India’s electricity grid, will not be easy. As North India battled its annual air pollution crisis, Indian delegates to the recent climate summit held in Scotland said developing countries were entitled to the responsible use of fossil fuels.

“How can anyone expect that developing countries can make promises about phasing out coal and fossil fuel subsidies?” Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav asked at the summit. “Developing countries have still to deal with their development agendas and poverty eradication.”

India and China were blamed for watering down a commitment to phasing out coal at the summit.

But in India, environmentalists said the country’s concerns were genuine. “The dilemma that India faces is, how quickly can it make the transition from coal?” said Chandra Bhushan, who heads the Delhi-based International Forum for Environment. “While coal does contribute to air pollution and climate change, we cannot shut down coal right away and replace it with renewables in a hurry. This is going to be a process.”

Meanwhile, the severe air pollution has led to a public health emergency with many residents in Delhi and other North Indian cities struggling with respiratory problems and doctors warning it is a serious health hazard.

The dirty air kills more than a million people every year in India according to a report by the Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago, a U.S. research group.
…

Two Indian journalists who were detained over the weekend on charges of inciting communal violence after tweeting that religious attacks on Muslims were worse than police had reported were granted bail by a court in the northeastern state of Tripura. 

Samriddhi K. Sakunia and Swarna Jha were reporting on religious tensions in the state, where there were attacks against minority Muslims last month. Police said at least one mosque and several shops and homes belonging to Muslims were vandalized, but reported no deaths. 

The attacks were seen as retaliation for violence against Hindus in neighboring Bangladesh earlier in October. Tripura borders Bangladesh and Muslims make up less than 9% of its nearly 4 million people. 

The court granted the journalists bail on Monday after the judge said “their detention was not required for the investigation as it would amount to infringement of their personal liberty,” Pijus Kanti Biswas, the lawyer representing the reporters, said Tuesday. 

Police said they had detained the journalists for “inciting communal violence by posting false and fabricated news on social media.” 

Their employer, HW News Network, a digital news channel, said the authorities were preventing them from doing their job, calling their detention “sheer harassment” and “targeting of the press.” 

The two reporters arrived in Tripura last Thursday and began reporting on the aftermath of the attacks. Sakunia tweeted a series of videos and images of mosques that had been vandalized, including one that showed photos of broken windows and damaged interiors in an attack she said police had denied. She said she visited the Chamtila mosque in the town of Panisagar and alleged it had been vandalized. “Tripura police denied the claim saying nothing has happened of that sort. But my report from the ground says otherwise,” she said in a tweet Saturday. 

Sakunia later tweeted that police arrived at the hotel where they were staying on Saturday night and told them they could not leave. On Sunday, they were given permission to leave but were then detained in neighboring Assam state at the request of Tripura police. 

HW News Network told the Indian Express newspaper that the reporters were detained for their “individual tweets” and not over news reports issued by the media organization. 

Their detention sparked widespread condemnations from journalists and rights groups, who say that media freedoms are under attack in India. The country’s ranking on the World Press Freedom Index has fallen in recent years, ranking 142nd out of 180 nations in 2020. 
…

Outside a Shiite shrine in Kabul, four armed Taliban fighters stood guard as worshippers filed in for Friday prayers. Alongside them was a guard from Afghanistan’s mainly Shiite Hazara minority, an automatic rifle slung over his shoulder. 

It was a sign of the strange, new relationship brought by the Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan in August. The Taliban, Sunni hard-liners who for decades targeted the Hazaras as heretics, are now their only protection against a more brutal enemy: the Islamic State group. 

Sohrab, the Hazara guard at the Abul Fazl al-Abbas Shrine, told The Associated Press that he gets along fine with the Taliban guards. “They even pray in the mosque sometimes,” he said, giving only his first name for security reasons. 

Not everyone feels so comfortable. 

Syed Aqil, a Hazara visiting the shrine with his wife and 8-month-old daughter, was disturbed that many Taliban still wear their traditional garb — the look of a jihadi insurgent — rather than a police uniform. 

“We can’t even tell if they are Taliban or Daesh,” he said, using the Arabic acronym for the Islamic State group. 

Since seizing power, the Taliban have presented themselves as more moderate, compared with their first rule in the 1990s when they violently repressed the Hazaras and other ethnic groups. Courting international recognition, they vow to protect the Hazaras as a show of their acceptance of the country’s minorities. 

But many Hazaras still deeply distrust the insurgents-turned-rulers, who are overwhelmingly ethnic Pashtu, and are convinced they will never accept them as equals in Afghanistan. Hazara community leaders say they have met repeatedly with Taliban leadership, asking to take part in the government, only to be shunned. Hazaras complain individual fighters discriminate against them and fear it’s only a matter of time before the Taliban revert to repression. 

“In comparison to their previous rule, the Taliban are a little better,” said Mohammed Jawad Gawhari, a Hazara cleric who runs an organization helping the poor. 

“The problem is that there is not a single law. Every individual Talib is their own law right now,” he said. “So people live in fear of them.” 

Some changes from the previous era of Taliban rule are clear. After their takeover, the Taliban allowed Shiites to perform their religious ceremonies, including the annual Ashura procession. 

The Taliban initially confiscated weapons that Hazaras had used to guard some of their own mosques in Kabul. But after devastating IS bombings of Shiite mosques in Kandahar and Kunduz provinces in October, the Taliban returned the weapons in most cases, Gawhari and other community leaders said. The Taliban also provide their own fighters as guards for some mosques during Friday prayers. 

“We are providing a safe and secure environment for everyone, especially the Hazaras,” said Taliban government spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid. “They should be in Afghanistan. Leaving the country is not good for anyone.”

The Hazaras’ turn to Taliban protection shows how terrified the community is of the Islamic State group, which they say aims to exterminate them. In past years, IS has attacked the Hazaras more ruthlessly than the Taliban ever did, unleashing bombings against Hazara schools, hospitals and mosques, killing hundreds. 

IS is also the Taliban’s enemy, frequently attacking Taliban forces. 

In Dashti Barchi, the sprawling district of west Kabul dominated by Hazaras, many were skeptical the Taliban will ever change. 

Marzieh Mohammedi, whose husband was killed five years ago in fighting with the Taliban, said she’s afraid every time she sees them patrolling. 

“How can they protect us? We can’t trust them. We feel like they are Daesh,” she said. 

The differences are partly religious. But Hazaras, who make up an estimated 10% of Afghanistan’s population of nearly 40 million, are also ethnically distinct and speak a variant of Farsi rather than Pashtu. They have a long history of being oppressed by the Pashtu majority, some of whom stereotype them as intruders. 

Aqil said that when he tried to go to a police station for a document, the Taliban guard only spoke Pashtu and impatiently slammed the gates in his face. He had to come back later with a Pashtu-speaking colleague. 

“This sort of situation makes me lose hope in the future,” he said. “They don’t know us. They are not broadminded to accept other communities. They act as if they are the owners of this country.” 

Frictions in the Hazaras’ central Afghanistan heartland have raised concerns. In Daikundi province, Taliban fighters killed 11 Hazara soldiers and two civilians, including a teenage girl, in August, according to Amnesty International. Taliban officials also expelled Hazara families from several Daikundi villages after accusing them of living on land that didn’t belong to them. 

After an uproar from Hazaras, further expulsions were halted, Gawhari and other community leaders said. 

The international community is pressing the Taliban to form a government that reflects Afghanistan’s ethnic, religious and political spectrum, including women. The Taliban’s Cabinet is comprised entirely of men from their own ranks. 

The highest level Hazara in the administration is a deputy health minister. A few Hazaras hold provincial posts, but they long ago joined the Taliban insurgency and adopted their hardline ideology. Few in the Hazara community recognize them. 

Ali Akbar Jamshidi, a former parliament member from Daikundi province, said the Hazara want to be brought into the Cabinet and intelligence and security agencies. 

“The Taliban can benefit from us,” he said. “They have the opportunity to form a government for the future, but they are not taking this opportunity.” 
…

With the severe humanitarian crisis ravaging Afghanistan, Kandahar’s Mirwais Hospital is reporting an increase in the number of young children suffering from acute malnourishment. Gaja Pellegrini reports from Kandahar. Contributor: Roshan Noorzai.
…

Pakistan rolled out a massive two-week drive Monday to immunize more than 90 million children in what officials hailed as one of the world’s biggest vaccination campaigns against measles and rubella.

An official announcement said children aged between 9 months and 15 years across the country will be inoculated against the contagious viral infections.

The Pakistani government has mobilized more than 600,000 health professionals, vaccinators and social mobilizers for the campaign with the support of Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, the United Nations Children’s Fund and the World Health Organization.

“Measles and rubella are contagious diseases and can have severe complications for children even death,” said Dr. Faisal Sultan, special assistant to the Pakistani prime minister on health.

“I urge both the front-line workers to work with dedication and the caregivers to express their support by vaccinating their children against the diseases,” Sultan added.

Officials said Pakistan has experienced an alarming rise in measles cases in recent years, affecting thousands of children and claiming many young lives.

“The measles and rubella campaign will move us not only one step closer to maintaining measles elimination and accelerating rubella control, but also one step closer to reducing the overall child mortality across Pakistan,” said WHO Country Representative Palitha Mahipala.

UNICEF said children under the age of five will also receive polio drops during the campaign to support Pakistan’s eradication efforts against the crippling disease. 

“Today’s world is still grappling with the very contagious measles and rubella viruses, none of which have gone away despite being entirely preventable with a simple vaccine,” said UNICEF Country Representative Aida Girma in remarks during the launch of the vaccination campaign in Pakistan.

The WHO says more than 140,000 people died from measles in 2018 worldwide – mostly children under the age of 5 years, despite the availability of a safe and effective vaccine.

Measles is caused by a virus in the paramyxovirus family and it is normally passed through direct contact and through the air.

WHO experts say there is no specific treatment for rubella but the disease is preventable by vaccination.

The rubella virus is transmitted by airborne droplets when infected people sneeze or cough. Humans are the only known host. 
…

A roadside bomb blew up on a busy avenue in the Afghan capital Kabul on Monday, wounding two people, police said. 

The bomb detonated as a taxi was passing by in the Kota-e Sangi district of western Kabul. The Taliban spokesman for Kabul police, who goes by a single name Mobin, said two people were wounded. Witnesses said one was a woman in the taxi and the other a man passing by. 

The blast came two days after a bomb exploded in a mini-bus in another part of western Kabul, killing at least one person and wounding five others. Colleagues identified the slain man as Hamid Sighyani, a journalist with Ariana TV. 

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the explosions. The Islamic State group has been waging a campaign of violence in Afghanistan, targeting Taliban fighters and civilians, especially members of the mainly Shiite Hazara ethnic group. 

 
…

An eviction drive in India’s northeastern state of Assam of residents living on government-owned land has heightened insecurities among the state’s Muslim population according to rights activists.    

The evictions being carried out in the remote state came into national spotlight after two people were killed in September during one of the drives to evict 800 mostly Muslim families from Dhalpur in Assam’s Darrang district.  

The violence caused outrage after a video that went viral on social media showed a policeman shooting a young man who was running toward him with a stick — he was among residents protesting the evictions and demanding rehabilitation. Seconds later, the video shows him lying motionless on the ground and a government-appointed photographer kicking the victim’s body. The young man, Moninul Haque, and a 12-year-old boy who got caught in the violence were killed.  

Many of those displaced told local media that they had been farming the land for decades since moving to the area after losing their own land to river erosion.    

The eviction drive resumed this month as Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party that rules the state vowed to press on with its campaign to clear people settled on government land.  

More than 500 families, who had been growing crops like ginger and turmeric, were evicted last week, from Lumding. Officials said the drive, for which hundreds of police and paramilitary soldiers were deployed, was peaceful. 

Critics and activists charge that the campaigns to clear government land are being carried out in areas populated predominantly by Muslims.     

The government denies this and says the drive is not targeted at any community but at people who are squatting on forest and government land. It says the land will be used for farming projects that will create jobs for “indigenous” people.

Suhas Chakma, Director of the Rights and Risks Analysis Group told VOA the evictions aim to satisfy the sentiment of Assamese-speaking people in the state.     

“It is very clear the action is selective. Otherwise, the state government should carry out a survey of such encroachments throughout the state, and not just conduct evictions in areas where mostly Muslims have settled,” points out Chakma. “If that is done, they would find thousands of people from all communities who have been cultivating government land for decades.”     

Assam’s population of 33 million includes Hindus, Muslims and several indigenous tribes. Among the residents are Bengali-speaking people, who came over the decades from Bangladesh with which the state shares a border.    

A spokesman for the Bharatiya Janata Party in Assam state, Rupam Goswami told VOA that majority of those evicted are Bengali-speaking Muslims because they account for most people settled on government land.    

“The drive is not targeting any one section but only encroachers, a majority of whom happen to be Muslims. Some Hindu people settled on forest land were also evicted,” says Goswami. “People cannot be allowed to destroy forests and settle on it. The eviction was an ongoing process since 2016. It is nothing new.”    

However, analysts point out that the eviction campaign has been fast tracked by the BJP since it won a second term in control in Assam earlier this year. In the runup to the polls, it had promised to free government land from “encroachers” and distribute it among “indigenous” people who are landless.  

Critics say the BJP is tapping into the state’s history of tensions between ethnic Assamese who have long complained of losing lands and jobs to Bengali-speaking people.    

“A divide has existed for many decades between the local Assamese and anyone who come from outside, irrespective of their religion. But with eviction drives like this, the BJP is deepening a wedge more specifically between the Bengali Muslims and the indigenous population,” says Niranjan Sahoo, a political analyst at the Observer Research Foundation in New Delhi. “Now, it is boiling down to religion.”     

The evictions have revived worries among the Muslims in Assam, especially those who were among about 1.9 million people left off a controversial citizenship register drawn up in the state in 2019 when people were asked to show documentary evidence that they or their ancestors had resided in India before 1971. The exercise aimed to identify illegal immigrants in Assam.    

Those not in the register are believed to include both Hindus and Muslims. But Muslims in Assam are more fearful because a controversial citizenship law passed in December 2019 will allow citizenship for migrants from nearby countries who are either Hindu or from one of five other religions, but not for Muslims.  

Analysts like Sahoo say the Assam evictions are another example of the fracturing of inter-community relations witnessed in India since the BJP came to power. “If you connect the dots, it is part of the BJP’s agenda to rally the Hindu base and create a divide between the majority community and the Muslims not just in Assam but other places also.”     

For the time being, the people evicted in Assam are living in cramped shanties without basic facilities. A body that represents minority communities, the All Assam Minorities Students Union, said the displaced are facing shortages of food, drinking water and medicine and demanded proper rehabilitation for them.    

The state government has said it will provide compensation and resettlement for families if they are citizens. “The government will give land to those who are landless,” said BJP’S spokesman Goswami.    

Activist Chakma counters by saying that “You cannot say I have evicted you and now you come and prove your citizenship. Many of them have proper identity papers. How many times will they have to prove that they are citizens?” 
…

Indian police, claiming “fake news” was being spread about anti-Muslim violence, have charged dozens of social media users in the northeastern state of Tripura — including members of private fact-finding groups looking into the violence.

Apparently reacting to attacks on Hindu temples and idols by Muslim mobs in Bangladesh in the second week of October, Hindu activists in Tripura ransacked and set fire to mosques and Muslim-owned homes and shops for about a week, starting October 21.

The fact-finding teams reported that dozens of homes and shops and 16 mosques were vandalized in the week of communal violence; four of the mosques and many of the shops and houses were also set on fire, according to some fact-finding teams, many of whose members took to social media.

The Tripura police have charged over 100 social media users under different Indian Penal Code sections, including the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act, for promoting enmity between different religious groups, forgery, criminal conspiracy and other charges, alleging that the posts were intended to spur further violence.

Those accused include students, social activists, lawyers on the fact-finding team, the student wing of an Islamic organization, regular citizens and others.

“The accounts which have been booked were spreading fake news, using fake videos and photos having no connection with Tripura. In fact, many social media users have deleted their related posts in the past week, after the news broke that we had booked many social media users. Some posts carrying fake info are still active. In our ongoing process we are trying to gather their details. We will act against them, too,” a Tripura police officer who did not want to be identified because the cases are in court now said to the VOA.

While some of the posts did, in fact, carry images unrelated to the Tripura violence, such as a photo of a fire in a Rohingya refugee camp in Delhi, other social media users were charged even though their posts did not carry any misinformation.

Hindu activists retaliate

India’s largest Hindu organization, Vishva Hindu Parishad; its youth wing – the Hindu nationalist militant organization Bajrang Dal; and other Hindu groups had organized more than a dozen marches and rallies to protest the anti-Hindu violence in Bangladesh. Some of the events, called “Hoonkar,” or “roar,” rallies, turned violent, vandalizing mosques and Muslim properties.

A shopkeeper from Panisagar town in Tripura state told VOA, “Hindu activists in a Hoonkar rally shouted abusive slogans” against Muslims and the Prophet Muhammad.

“They set ablaze two shops in the presence of police, I witnessed,” he said.

Soubhik Dey, the police chief of Tripura’s Panisagar subdivision told The Indian Express that activists from a VHP-led rally ransacked a mosque, houses and shops, before setting ablaze two shops in his subdivision.

However, Vinod Bansal, national spokesperson of VHP denied the charge of Hindu attacks.

“In the entire state of Tripura, no Hindu has attacked any mosque, Muslim-owned shop or house. No Hindu resorted to any violence. In social media the jihadists are spreading fake news that the Hindus vandalized or set ablaze Muslim properties,” Bansal told VOA.

Although the Inspector General of Police of Tripura, Saurabh Tripathi, told Asian News International, an Indian news agency, that “No fire incident took place at any mosque in Tripura” during the recent violence, Delhi-based lawyer Ansar Indori, who visited Tripura after the violence, said he saw three burned mosques there.

“We reported about these burnt mosques in our fact-finding report. Our report carries what exactly we saw with our eyes. In the cases of the burnt mosques, we conducted our inquiry and cross-verification very well,” Indori, secretary of the Delhi-based National Confederation of Human Rights Organizations, told VOA.

“It’s difficult to believe that police have charged me under UAPA- a law generally used against terrorists,” he said.

On Thursday, Jyotishman Das Choudhary, the public relations officer of Tripura Police, told VOA that since all cases related to the violence are being directly supervised by the state’s High Court, no one from his organization could comment on them.

‘Police actions to scare victims’

Supreme Court lawyer Ehtesham Hashmi, the leader of Indori’s fact-finding team said that his fact-finding team members have shared nothing that can be regarded as anti-national or unconstitutional.

“By filing the FIR,” he said, referring to a first information report, or registered police complaint, “the police want to send a message that if they can take action even against Supreme Court lawyers and journalists they can easily act against ordinary people,” Hashmi told VOA.

“The actions against us are meant to scare away the victims so that they do not come forward to lodge FIRs despite being affected by the violence.”

The Supreme Court has agreed to take up for “urgent hearing” a petition challenging the constitutional validity of the anti-terrorism law UAPA having been used against lawyers and journalists for their social media posts on the Tripura Violence. Lawyer Hashmi told VOA Sunday that his colleagues have already presented their fact-finding report to the Supreme Court for its perusal.

Delhi University teacher and writer Apoorvanand, who uses one name, said the Tripura police did not apply force when Muslims were being attacked because it was busy “lying to the world and hiding the fact of the violence.”

“Now Tripura police is upset that the lawyers’ team and some independent journalists and citizens have brought out in the open the truth of the anti-Muslim violence in Tripura,” Apoorvanand told VOA.

“This is what the BJP governments have been doing in other states as well: first allow violence against Muslim and other marginalized communities and then persecute and penalize those who try to report it or help the victims,” he said.

“The violence in Tripura and the behavior of the police prove that India has turned into one of the most dangerous countries for Muslims, journalists and human rights workers.”
…

Officials, relatives and a media watchdog in Afghanistan confirmed Saturday that a suspected bomb blast on a minibus in Kabul had killed a well-known journalist and injured several people. 

The violence happened near a Taliban checkpoint in the Afghan capital’s western Dasht-e Barchi area, dominated by members of the minority Shiite Hazara community.

The slain journalist was identified as Hamid Saighani, who worked for the mainstream Ariana television network.

“Yet another journalist killed in Afghanistan,” tweeted Afghanistan Journalists Center, an independent local media monitor, hours after the blast. It noted that Saighani was at least the ninth journalist killed in Afghanistan this year. 

Saighani’s wife, Fawzia Wahdat, also a journalist, posted “I lost Hamid” on her Facebook page.

Zabihullah Mujahid, the chief spokesman for the acting Taliban government, tweeted that one person had been killed and two injured. He said an investigation was underway. 

There were no immediate claims of responsibility for the attack, but Afghan Hazara have for years been the target of deadly violence by the regional Islamic State affiliate known as Islamic State-Khorasan Province (IS-Khorasan). 

The terror group has intensified bombings and other attacks in Afghanistan since the Taliban returned to power in mid-August. 

Representatives of the acting Taliban government earlier this week claimed that an ongoing counterterror operation has captured around 600 IS-Khorasan militants and killed more than three dozen in the last three months. 

Data from the local media group Afghan Journalists Safety Committee says at least 67 journalists were killed in Afghanistan between 2013 and 2020, for which the Taliban is listed as responsible for 27 cases. 

It is not known whether Saighani may have been the intended target of Saturday’s attack. 
…

Authorities in Pakistan say an anti-terrorism raid and bomb blasts have killed at least five security personnel and wounded seven people.

The casualties occurred Saturday in southwestern Baluchistan and northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) provinces.

The army’s media wing said in a statement that security forces carried out an operation in Baluchistan’s Turbat city “based on intelligence about the presence of externally supported terrorists” there. 

The ensuing clashes left two soldiers dead and inflicted “heavy losses” on militants. Another soldier was killed in a “related incident” while clearing a terrorist-planted bomb along a route frequented by civilians, according to the statement.

Earlier in the day, a roadside bomb blast on the outskirts of Quetta, the capital of Baluchistan, wounded at least one police official and six civilians, including women.

A senior police officer told local media the explosives were planted in a parked motorcycle and a police patrol was apparently the target. There were no claims of responsibility.

Islamist militants and Baluch separatists both operate in Baluchistan.

Separately, officials in Pakistan’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province said two policemen were killed when a roadside bomb hit their routine patrol Saturday morning in Bajaur district near the country’s border with Afghanistan. No one claimed credit for the bombing. 

Cease-fire with TTP

Militants linked to outlawed Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), known as the Pakistani Taliban, often claim responsibly for attacks against military and civil targets across the country. The years of militant violence has killed thousands of Pakistanis, including civilians and security forces.

The Pakistani military has carried out sustained operations against TTP strongholds near the Afghan border in recent years, killing thousands of militants and forcing others to take refuge in Afghanistan.

However, Saturday’s violence came just days after a monthlong cease-fire between the Pakistan government and the TTP went into effect, on November 9, in a bid to sustain a nascent peace dialogue between the two adversaries.

Both sides have said the talks are taking place at an undisclosed location in Afghanistan and the neighboring country’s interim Taliban government is aiding the peace process. 

TTP, an alliance of about two dozen militant groups, maintains it is fighting for the implementation of an Islamic system in Pakistan and denounces existing governance as un-Islamic.

Neither side has publicly shared any details of the ongoing discussions, but the government dismisses the TTP demand and maintains the talks are happening strictly in line with Pakistan’s Islamic constitution and legal framework.
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When Gulzar Ahmad Dar reads the local newspaper, he isn’t interested in the news and latest events in Kashmir. He wants to know what is happening to his son, Manan Gulzar Dar.

The photojournalist, whose work has appeared in local outlets and publications such as The Guardian and the Pacific Press photo agency, was arrested October 10 as part of a conspiracy case in which India says militant groups were plotting to take action.

Ahmad Dar accompanied his son to the police station in the Batamaloo locality of Srinagar that day. But since then, the family has received few details about what has happened to Manan Dar, or a second son who was also arrested. 

It was only through media reports that they know the National Investigation Agency (NIA) took Manan Dar into custody in New Delhi, more than 15 hours away by car.

“I got to know about my son’s arrest through neighbors and friends who have read the media reports,” Ahmad Dar told VOA.

Sitting in a small room in the family home in Batamaloo, filled with the sorrow of separation, Manan Dar’s mother, Fahmida, described her son as a jolly fellow and a wonderful photographer. 

“I would have shown you his brilliant work. However, the mobile gadgets of family including my two sons are with the security agencies,” she told VOA.

Mass conspiracy charges 

Manan Dar and his younger brother — a 23-year-old college student who was arrested on October 17 — are among more than 20 people detained across Indian-controlled Kashmir as part of a mass conspiracy case.

When asked about the charges, Shariq Iqbal, a Delhi-based lawyer representing the journalist said, “Right now there is no individual charge against anyone. There is only a general charge.”

Manan Dar and his family have denied any involvement in the alleged conspiracy, Iqbal said. 

Satish Tamta, the senior lawyer in the case, told VOA, “We are also as much in dark as you are.”

The lack of clarity for the accused and their families, who often have little idea why their relative was arrested or where they are being detained, is a problem across Indian-controlled Kashmir.

Manan Dar is not a lone case of a journalist in the Kashmir valley suddenly facing serious accusations, often related to terrorism.

Anti-terror laws 

Kashmiri lawyer Mirza Saaib Bég told VOA that the prevailing uncertainty on what will merit a charge under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act or other anti-terror laws has a direct and detrimental effect on the quality of information available to the public.

“Even in a situation where the charge is proven false, reliance on anti-terror legislation has potential to create suspicion and indifference towards the victim because the general public assumes that the person must have done something to merit being charged under a legislation as drastic as the UAPA,” said Bég. 

As well as practicing law, Bég is a Weidenfeld-Hoffmann scholar at Oxford University. 

India’s anti-terror laws are vaguely worded and broadly designed, granting sweeping powers of detention that can extend for many months even before the matter is listed before any court, he said.

“The law fails to provide any legal safeguards that would prevent arbitrary abuse of the powers. These anti-terror legislations are so prone to abuse that one may wonder whether they have been shaped in this manner out of incompetence or out of malice,” Bég said. 

Police in the Jammu and Kashmir region, and in the district where Manan Dar lives, did not respond to VOA’s emails requesting comment. The Indian embassy in Washington did not respond to a request for comment.

Conflict in Kashmir 

The region’s media have long come under pressure, both from regional and central Indian authorities and separatists. India and Pakistan both claim the territory, and for decades Indian-controlled Kashmir has been the site of clashes and conflict between Indian forces and separatists. 

But since India revoked the region’s autonomy in 2019, media activists have cited a rise in arrests and harassment of journalists.

The U.N. special rapporteur on freedom of expression and the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention have also raised concerns about the “alleged arbitrary detention and intimidation of journalists covering the situation in Jammu and Kashmir.” 

While the Press Council of India was in Kashmir last month to investigate conditions for the region’s press, police detained or issued summonses to five journalists, two of whom were accused of “disturbing public peace” and sent to Anantnag district jail. 

The press council arranged the visit in response to a letter from former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti about the harassment of Kashmiri journalists. 

Meenakshi Ganguly, South Asia director at Human Rights Watch, says the spate of harassment, including what she believes are politically motivated arrests of Kashmiri journalists, is extremely concerning.

“The Indian authorities have repeatedly defended their actions in Jammu and Kashmir and deny serious allegations of human rights violations, which then raises obvious questions about what they might have to hide by threatening journalists to prevent them from doing their jobs,” she said. 

Ganguly described a “worrying trend in the abuse of counterterrorism and sedition laws to arrest activists and critics” and detain them for lengthy periods. “Kashmiri journalists and activists are particularly at risk,” she said. 

Chilling effect 

Aasif Sultan, who worked for the monthly Kashmir Narrator, has been detained in Srinagar’s Central Jail for three years for alleged complicity in “harboring known terrorists” — a charge media rights groups believe is in retaliation for his reporting.

His detention and “other cases of arrests, detentions, interrogations and seemingly innocuous inquiries into their reports have a chilling effect on journalists,” said Geeta Seshu, co-editor of India’s free expression group the Free Speech Collective. 

“If (the government) has a problem with any news reports, there are other mechanisms it could resort to. Such punitive and criminalizing action is highly condemnable,” Seshu said. 

Journalists self-censor to avoid getting into trouble with the authorities or because they can’t be certain if their news outlet will back them, Seshu said. “In Kashmir, we are seeing increasing instances of journalists being picked up for no rhyme nor reason, irrespective of whether they self-censor or not,” Seshu said.

Raid on family home 

Back in Batamaloo, the Dar family is still recovering from the shock of their sons’ arrests and a raid on their home.

“The National Investigation Agency stormed our home on October 13 and took mobile gadgets and land ownership papers,” Ahmad Dar said.

The NIA has stated that during the operation, it confiscated several gadgets and what it described as incriminating material.

The security agency said it has “reliable information” that the Lashkar-e-Taiba and other terrorist groups in Jammu and Kashmir are “conspiring, both physically and in cyberspace … to perform lethal terrorist acts,” according to the Indian news website The Wire. 

Manan Dar is due to appear before a district judge in New Delhi on November 27, his lawyer told VOA.

 
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Taliban authorities in Afghanistan said a bomb ripped through a crowded mosque in eastern Nangarhar province Friday during afternoon prayers, wounding at least 15 worshippers.

Provincial government spokesman Mohammad Hanif told VOA the explosive device was planted inside the mosque, but he said there were no deaths.

Eyewitnesses reported a much higher casualty toll, however. The mosque in the Spin Ghar district was attended by Sunni Muslims.

There were no immediate claims of responsibility for the bombing in an Afghan province where militants linked to the regional affiliate of Islamic State known as Islamic State-Khorasan Province conduct nearly daily bombings and shootings against Taliban forces and civilians.

IS-Khorasan has claimed responsibility for dozens of attacks in parts of Afghanistan, including the capital, Kabul, since the Taliban took over the country in mid-August. The violence has killed and injured hundreds of people, mostly members of the minority Shi’ite community.

The Taliban have responded by launching operations against suspected IS-Khorasan hideouts in a bid to suppress the terrorist threat.

On Wednesday, a spokesman for the Taliban intelligence agency told reporters in Kabul their counterterrorism campaign had rounded up 600 IS-Khorasan militants, including key commanders, and killed close to 40 others.

U.S. officials expressed skepticism when asked for comment on Taliban successes against IS operatives in Afghanistan.

“We have seen the Taliban claims,” a State Department spokesperson told VOA on condition of anonymity in order to discuss the unverified claims. “We note that ISIS-K remains a resilient enemy.” 

“It is clearly in the Taliban’s interest to continue to focus their efforts on eliminating this virulent terrorist group,” the spokesperson added.

Friday’s bombing came on a day when Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi told an audience during his ongoing visit to neighboring Pakistan that his interim government has brought political stability and security to all of Afghanistan in a short period of time.
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