Afghanistan does not need a large military anymore and would not keep all the people who worked in the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces (ANDSF) under the previous administration, said the Taliban’s foreign minister, Amir Khan Muttaqi, Friday in Islamabad. 

“The army that was created by foreign intervention, we are no longer in need of having such large numbers,” said Muttaqi at a public talk in one of Pakistan’s government-sponsored policy organizations, the Institute of Strategic Studies.

He was responding to a question about the Taliban’s strategy for integrating Taliban fighters and ANDSF personnel into one military, something the Taliban had indicated in the past they might consider if they took over the country. 

He said his country needed a small army “made up of people with fidelity and commitment and patriotism ingrained in them.” 

The Taliban foreign minister was in Pakistan with a 20-member delegation for negotiations on opening trade routes among other things. On Thursday, he also met the special representatives on Afghanistan from the United States, China, and Russia, who were in Pakistan for a meeting under the Troika Plus format—the three countries plus Pakistan—on Afghanistan.   

Muttaqi bristled when asked about issues of human rights and inclusivity in his administration, accusing the international community of using the issues for political purposes. 

“Yesterday, the opposition [the Taliban] deserved to die. Yet, that was not a violation [of human rights] and today it is a violation,” he said, warning that the international community has not learned the lesson in 20 years that pressure tactics do not work with the Taliban. 

He also claimed the current Taliban administration is inclusive because it has members of various ethnicities in it, but asserts the international community is trying to force them to include their political opponents, which is not the norm anywhere else.  

“We have never asked [U.S.] President [Joe] Biden to include [former] president [Donald] Trump in his cabinet,” he said.

Journalist Tahir Khan, who has covered the Taliban for many years, said that so far, the Taliban have not appointed anyone who was not already aligned with them. 

“Ninety percent of the appointments are active members of Taliban, either commanders or fighters. The other 10% are their supporters on social media or otherwise.”

In multiple regional conferences on Afghanistan since the Taliban took power, including the Troika Plus in Islamabad Thursday, the demand for inclusivity has taken center stage. 

The joint statement issued after Thursday’s meeting “called on the Taliban to work with fellow Afghans to take steps to form an inclusive and representative government that respects the rights of all Afghans and provides for the equal rights of women and girls to participate in all aspects of Afghan society.”

Similar statements were made earlier in conferences in New Delhi, Tehran, and Moscow. 

Khan said it was obvious the world “is demanding that the Taliban include other political groups and forces in the government.”

On rights of women to work and study, Muttaqi said the situation is gradually improving. 

“Currently, 100% female workers in the health sector have returned to work,” he said. “In [the] education sector, it is now up to 75%.”

He also claimed the Taliban have not fired a single woman from her job since they came to power. Human Rights Watch’s Heather Barr disagreed. 

“Maybe they didn’t say to any women you are fired from your job, but they’ve certainly told many, many, many women that they shouldn’t come to work, and they shouldn’t come to work indefinitely,” she said. 

Women’s rights activists underscore that since the Taliban takeover of the country, girls in secondary schools in most of the country have been denied access to education, even though boys’ schools are open. Taliban officials say they are working on a plan to open schools for everyone but have not given a time frame. 

“We have 200,000 teachers that work in these educational institutions, and we need help and assistance in providing their salaries. No one has yet practically stepped forward to pay their salaries,” Muttaqi said when VOA specifically questioned him on this issue. 

Rights advocates say that is an excuse the Taliban are using to discriminate against women. 

“If the problem is that they can’t pay teachers, then that’s a problem for boys as well as girls. … and if they’ve made a decision that with limited resources they should prioritize boys’ education over girls’ education, well, that’s very discriminatory, isn’t it?” Barr asked. 

The Taliban have repeatedly said they are making preparations to open secondary schools, which, according to Barr, made it sound like the schools needed to comply with their views on Shariah.

“The truth is that there were no mixed government secondary schools in Afghanistan prior to August 15 … so, this is a completely fake reason,” she said.  

UNICEF announced earlier this month it was setting up a system to be able to pay Afghan teachers directly, bypassing the Taliban, according to a Reuters report. Funding to or through the Taliban-led administration is frozen by the international community. 

In a telephone briefing from Brussels earlier this week, the U.S. special representative on Afghanistan, Thomas West, said several international organizations were doing “creative and urgent thinking” to deliver salaries to teachers, civil servants and other in Afghanistan.

“The United States has not taken a position on this matter,” he said. 

Muttaqi said the current Taliban administration was trying to take a balanced approach in international relations, unlike previous governments that either completely caved under international pressure or divorced themselves from the international community altogether. The latter was a reference to the earlier Taliban regime that ruled Afghanistan from 1996-2001. 

He said, while formal recognition of the Taliban regime is yet to come, they enjoyed de facto recognition. 

“As for international recognition, what we are experiencing is that we are being recognized and treated as an official government of Afghanistan in our travels and in other cases,” he said. “Embassies are open inside our country, and we have embassies and representation in foreign countries.”
…

A U.S. Defense Department report citing the construction of a 100-home village in disputed territory between the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh and Tibet has turned the spotlight on India’s concerns about a push by China to create civilian settlements along their disputed Himalayan border.

“China has undertaken construction activities in the past several years along the border areas, including in the areas that it has illegally occupied over decades,” India’s External Affairs Ministry spokesperson, Arindam Bagchi, said Thursday.

“India has neither accepted such illegal occupation of our territory nor has it accepted the unjustified Chinese claims,” he said.

New Delhi was responding to queries on the 2021 edition of the Pentagon’s annual report, Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China, which referred to construction activities by China along the India-China border areas.

The report said that despite ongoing diplomatic and military dialogue to reduce border tensions, China has “continued taking incremental and tactical actions to press its claims at the LAC” — the Line of Actual Control that divides the two countries.

It said that “Sometime in 2020, the PRC built a large 100-home civilian village inside disputed territory between the PRC’s Tibet Autonomous Region and India’s Arunachal Pradesh state in the eastern sector of the LAC. These and other infrastructure development efforts along the India-China border have been a source of consternation in the Indian government and media.”

Based on satellite images, reports of the village along the Arunachal Pradesh border had first surfaced earlier this year while India and China were involved in a tense standoff along a different stretch of their disputed Himalayan border.

It was red-flagged by security experts in New Delhi because it lies along a hotly contested border — China claims the state of Arunachal Pradesh as part of southern Tibet, while New Delhi says the northeastern state is an integral part of India.

At that time China’s Foreign Affairs Ministry defended its construction, saying the country’s “normal construction on its own territory is entirely a matter of sovereignty,” and is “beyond reproach.”

According to security analysts, China has built more than 600 villages on its border all along the 3,488-kilometer Line of Actual Control stretching from eastern Arunachal Pradesh in the east to Ladakh. They say the construction in remote mountain areas is part of a larger strategic goal to reinforce China’s territorial claims along disputed Himalayan frontiers.

“The Chinese are building villages possibly for billeting and locating their civilians or for the military in the future all along the LAC, particularly after the recent face off that we have had,” Indian Chief of Defense Staff Bipin Rawat said on Thursday speaking at a media event.

However, he said that no village had been built inside Indian territory.

Rawat called China India’s main adversary and not Pakistan. Saying that a lack of “trust” and growing “suspicion” is coming in the way of resolving the border dispute between the two countries, he said that India was stocked up for a “long winter.”

Both countries have beefed up military deployments all along the Himalayas, including Arunachal Pradesh. India says it is also focusing on improving infrastructure to meet the country’s security requirements.

“The government is committed to the objective of creating infrastructure along border areas for improvement of livelihood, including in Arunachal Pradesh,” External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Bagchi said. 

However, analysts point out that although India is making strides in building roads and bridges in the Himalayas to transport troops and weapons, it cannot match the pace at which China has strengthened border infrastructure.

 
…

Pakistan hosted China, Russia, and the United States Thursday for talks on Afghanistan, bringing them to Islamabad at the same time as a Taliban delegation led by Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi, who arrived Wednesday night.

“We are confident that Troika Plus’s engagement with the new Afghan government will help consolidate peace and stability, promote sustainable economic development, and constrict space for terrorist outfits operating from and within Afghanistan,” Pakistan’s foreign minister, Shah Mahmood Qureshi, said in opening remarks.

Talking to media later, he promised to involve the Taliban officially in future regional meetings.

“God willing, we will invite them in the next meeting in Beijing so that their concerns should be shared with the world, and they should know what the world community expects from them in return,” Qureshi told journalists in the capital, Islamabad.

In a joint statement after the meeting, the four countries of the Troika Plus format pressed the Taliban to provide access to education for women and girls of all ages. The Taliban have suspended secondary school education for girls in most provinces since their August 15 takeover of the country.

The statement also called upon the Taliban to “ensure unhindered humanitarian access, including by women aid workers, for the delivery of humanitarian assistance in Afghanistan to respond to the developing crisis.”

In many Afghan provinces, local Taliban commanders are demanding that female aid workers are always accompanied by a close male relative, making their jobs difficult or in some cases impossible.

At the same time, the special representatives for Afghanistan from the four countries that participated in the meeting agreed on the need for urgent humanitarian assistance and urged the United Nations to take the lead in coordinating help for the Afghan population.

International aid agencies have sounded the alarm on Afghanistan’s situation, calling it one of the worst humanitarian crises.

“Now we have over 22 million people marching toward starvation,” said the World Food Program’s executive director, David Beasley, in a video message he tweeted from Kabul airport Thursday.

The situation is made more difficult because the United States has frozen nearly $10 billion in Afghan government assets in U.S. banks until the Taliban fulfill their commitments to the international community.

The Troika Plus, or extended Troika, format was created by Russia and included Iran and the four countries meeting Thursday in Islamabad. However, Iran has been reluctant to attend meetings that put their officials face to face with U.S. officials.

In a telephone briefing Monday in Brussels, U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan Thomas West underlined the importance of working with the region, including Iran, “on our common and abiding interest in a stable Afghanistan,” he said.

He also emphasized that the Taliban needed to deliver on their promises on human rights and women’s rights.

“Statements are not enough,” he said.

According to West, the formation of an inclusive and representative government was “a point I think is especially shared by many regional powers as well.”

Thursday’s meeting is the fourth on Afghanistan by its neighbors since the Taliban takeover. The three others were held in Moscow, Tehran, and New Delhi. China and Pakistan stayed away from the New Delhi meeting Wednesday, with China citing scheduling issues and Pakistan’s national security adviser calling India a “spoiler” in Afghanistan.

In October, senior U.S. officials, including West, engaged with the Taliban directly in Qatar’s capital, Doha, and more engagement is expected.

“We are preparing for a next round of interagency U.S. engagement with the Taliban,” West said, without giving dates.
…

Afghanistan is “at the brink of economic collapse” and the international community must urgently resume funding and provide humanitarian assistance, Pakistan’s foreign minister warned Thursday as U.S., Chinese, Russian and Taliban diplomats met in Islamabad.

Shah Mehmood Qureshi spoke at the opening of the so-called “troika plus” meeting, which included Thomas West, the new U.S. special envoy for Afghanistan. The delegates also met later Thursday with Taliban foreign minister Amir Khan Muttaqi.

“Today, Afghanistan stands at the brink of an economic collapse,” Qureshi said, adding that any further downward slide would “severely limit” the new Taliban government’s ability to run the country.

“It is, therefore, imperative for the international community to buttress provision of humanitarian assistance on an urgent basis,” he said.

That included enabling Afghanistan to access funds frozen by Western donors since the Taliban took control of the country in August, he added.

Resuming the flow of funding “will dovetail into our efforts to regenerate economic activities and move the Afghan economy towards stability and sustainability”, Qureshi said.

Doing so would benefit Western countries also, he argued in later comments to state media.

“If you think that you are far, Europe is safe and those areas you imagine will not be affected by terrorism, don’t forget the history,” he said. “We have learned from the history and we don’t want to repeat those mistakes made in the past.”

The United Nations has repeatedly warned that Afghanistan is on the brink of the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, with more than half the country facing “acute” food shortages and winter forcing millions to choose between migration and starvation.

The troika plus meeting represents envoy West’s first trip to the region since taking over from Zalmay Khalilzad, the long-serving diplomat who spearheaded talks that led to the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan earlier this year.

The State Department said earlier in the week that West also plans to visit Russia and India.

“Together with our partners, he will continue to make clear the expectations that we have of the Taliban and of any future Afghanistan government,” State Department spokesman Ned Price told a briefing this week.

West, who was in Brussels earlier this week to brief NATO on US engagement with the Taliban, told reporters the Islamists have “very clearly” voiced their desire to see aid resumed, normalise international relations and achieve sanctions relief.

He called for unity from allies on those issues, noting that Washington “can deliver none of these things on our own”. 
…

Afghanistan’s Taliban said Wednesday they have rounded up nearly 600 members of the local Islamic State affiliate, known as Islamic State-Khorasan Province, since returning to power in mid-August.  

A spokesman for the General Directorate of Intelligence, the new name of the Afghan spy agency under Islamist Taliban rule, told reporters in Kabul that “high-ranking” commanders of IS-Khorasan were also among the detainees.

“These men linked to Daesh are now being held in jails under tight security,” Kahlil Hamraz told a news conference in Kabul, using a local, derogatory name for IS-Khorasan.

He said ongoing security operations against the group have also killed almost 40 militants. 

Hamraz accused the former Afghan government of releasing some 1,800 IS-Khorasan militants along with other criminals from detention facilities just before the Taliban took over Kabul in August. He said the freed prisoners were behind a recent uptick in car bombings and other violent activity in parts of Afghanistan.

IS-Khorasan has claimed responsibility for dozens of attacks across the country, including suicide bombings. The violence has killed and injured hundreds of Afghan civilians and Taliban forces.

The Taliban released details of their purported successes against IS-Khorasan amid growing criticism of their ability to effectively deal with an increasing terrorist threat. 

U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan Thomas West said this week the rise in IS-Khorasan attacks and al-Qaida’s ongoing presence in the South Asian nation was a matter of deep concern for Washington.  

The U.S. envoy, however, told reporters in Brussels on Monday the Taliban were undertaking “a very vigorous effort” against the terror group.

“We condemn the innocent loss of Afghan lives that have taken place in recent weeks at the hands of vicious ISIS-K attacks across the country…I think we’re worried about the uptick in ISIS-K attacks and we want the Taliban to be successful against them,” West said. He used an acronym for Islamic State.

U.S. officials have warned that IS-Khorasan could develop the ability to strike outside Afghanistan within a year and that al-Qaida could do the same within one or two years.

The 2020 U.S.-Taliban deal that ended the two-decade U.S.-led foreign military presence in Afghanistan requires the Islamist group prevent transnational terrorist groups, including al-Qaida, from recruiting, fund-raising, training or planning attacks. 

“When it comes to other groups, look, al-Qaida continues to have a presence in Afghanistan that we are very concerned about, and that is an issue of ongoing concern for us in our dialogue with the Taliban,” said West, who assumed office last month.
…

An international aid group says an estimated 300,000 Afghans, including women and children, have fled across the border into Iran in search of safety since the Taliban seized control of Afghanistan in August.

The Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) released its findings Wednesday, saying the numbers continue to rise, while “between 4,000 and 5,000 Afghans are fleeing into Iran each day via informal border crossings.”

The NRC’s Iranian operation is supporting these families in addition to hundreds of thousands Afghans who have been sheltering in the country for years, it said. Tehran is grappling with a deepening economic crisis of its own.

“Iran cannot be expected to host so many Afghans with so little support from the international community,” said NRC Secretary General Jan Egeland, who is visiting the country this week and speaking to the families. “There must be an immediate scale up of aid both inside Afghanistan and in neighboring countries like Iran, before the deadly winter cold.”

The Taliban marched into the Afghan capital, Kabul, on August 15 after overrunning the rest of country in stunning battlefield victories against Western-backed former Afghan government forces as the United States and NATO militaries withdrew from the country.

The Islamist group’s return to power prompted tens of thousands of people to flee the country on U.S.-led chaotic emergency evacuation flights to meet the August 31 withdrawal deadline for foreign troops.

Former Afghan government officials, security forces and those who served international forces in different capacities over the past 20 years were among those who departed Afghanistan fearing Taliban reprisals.

Western countries have since cut off financial aid and blocked the Taliban’s access to nearly $10 billion Afghan central bank assets, largely held in the U.S. over human rights concerns.

The sanctions have triggered fears of an economic meltdown in Afghanistan where the United Nations says years of war and a prolonged drought have threatened nearly 23 million people with starvation this winter compared to 14 million just two months ago.

The U.N. refugee agency’s appeal for nearly $300 million to support Afghans fleeing to neighboring countries is only 32 percent funded so far.

Pakistan, which already hosts about 3 million Afghans fleeing four decades of conflict and ensuing economic difficulties, has tightened border controls since the Taliban takeover of the neighboring country to block any new influx of Afghan refugees.

Pakistani authorities have been urging the world to establish temporary camps inside Afghanistan to contain fleeing families, saying Islamabad’s own economic troubles do not allow it absorb new refugees.
…

Pakistan will host the United States, China and Russia this week for talks on Afghanistan under what is known as the “troika plus” process.   

Officials in Islamabad have confirmed to VOA that Amir Khan Muttaqi, the foreign minister of the Afghan Taliban, has also been invited to the meeting, scheduled for Thursday, describing his participation as an “important” development.   

Newly-appointed U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan Thomas West and his Russian, Chinese and Pakistani counterparts will lead their respective delegations at the talks.

Leaders are expected to reiterate international calls for the Islamist Taliban to ensure inclusivity in the political governance in Kabul and protect rights of all Afghans, including women and minorities.  

Pakistani officials said Muttaqi will arrive in the country Wednesday as the head of a high-level ministerial delegation and will hold wide-ranging bilateral talks with counterparts in Islamabad, before joining the multilateral meeting the day after.  

Moscow hosted previous troika

Moscow hosted the last troika plus talks in October but Washington stayed away from the meeting, citing logistical reasons. A day before the talks in the Russian capital, the then-U.S. special envoy for Afghanistan, Zalmay Khalilzad, had resigned and officials said his successor, West, was not prepared to attend the Moscow huddle.  

West left Washington earlier in the week on his first trip to Europe and Asia to discuss the way forward on Afghanistan with allies and partners. He told reporters in Brussels on Monday that he will be visiting Pakistan later this week but shared no further details. 

Thursday’s troika plus meeting comes amid United Nations calls for donor nations to scale up humanitarian assistance for Afghanistan, saying more than half of the country’s estimated 40 million population is likely to go hungry this winter. 

The Taliban returned to power in Kabul last August following the withdrawal of U.S.-led foreign troops from Afghanistan after 20 years of involvement in the war.  

The global community has ignored Taliban calls for recognizing their interim Kabul government over human rights concerns and lack of inclusivity in the governance system. 

Financial assistance cut off

Western countries have cut off billions of dollars in financial assistance to the country and blocked the Taliban’s access to Afghan foreign assets of nearly $10 billion, largely held in the United States.   

The restrictions have plunged Afghanistan into an economic crisis and increased humanitarian needs to record levels, which stem from years of war and a prolonged widespread drought. 

“The Taliban have voiced very clearly and openly their desire to normalize relations with the international community, to see a resumption in aid, to see a return of the international diplomatic community to Kabul, to see sanctions relief,” West said in Brussels. “And the United States can deliver none of these things on our own, and we have to work together with the international community in order to see those things.”   

West said that Washington was “not seriously thinking” about reopening its embassy in Kabul at this time. “I think what we want to see is the establishment of a record of responsible conduct by the Taliban, of predictable conduct, and then we’ll assess what needs we have on the diplomatic front.”
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LGBTQ Afghans fearing for their lives under the Taliban in Afghanistan are expressing hope that the international community will relocate them to a safer place. VOA’s Breshna Tahrek has the story.
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Pakistani officials announced Monday that the government and the outlawed militant alliance known as the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) had agreed on a “complete cease-fire” as the two sides negotiate an end to years of militancy in the country. 

Federal Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry made the disclosure while speaking to state-run television. He said the tentative truce “would be extendable, keeping in view the progress of negotiations.”

Chaudhry stressed the dialogue with the TTP, also known as the Pakistani Taliban, was being held “strictly in line with the constitution and the law of Pakistan.” 

The peace process is taking place at an undisclosed location in Afghanistan, and Chaudhry said the neighboring country’s interim Taliban government has “facilitated these talks.” He did not share further details. 

A spokesman for the TTP confirmed it has agreed to a one-month cease-fire with the government starting November 9 and that talks between the two sides are continuing. 

“It is necessary that both sides observe the cease-fire,” said Mohammad Khorasani. He added that the Afghan Taliban “is filling the role of mediator … in the current negotiations process.” 

Pakistani officials privy to the negotiations said the tentative truce requires that the militant group halt attacks across the country in return for the release of an unknown number of TTP prisoners “as part of confidence-building measures” to move the peace process forward. 

Last month in a television interview, Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan revealed for the first time that his government had been engaged in talks with the TTP, saying Afghanistan was hosting the process and Taliban rulers there were acting as mediators. 

Interior Minister Sirajuddin Haqqani of the Taliban’s interim government in Afghanistan, is acting as a mediator in Pakistan’s peace talks with the TTP. He heads the notorious Haqqani network of militants designated as a global terrorist by the United States. Haqqani is wanted by the U.S. and carries a bounty of $10 million for information leading to his arrest. 

The Afghan Taliban interior minister allegedly maintains ties with the Pakistani spy agency and the TTP, which Washington and the United Nations have designated as a global terrorist group. 

Tens of thousands of Pakistanis, including security forces, have died in terrorist attacks that the Pakistani Taliban have claimed since the group emerged in 2007. 

Failed talks with the TTP in the past prompted Pakistan to launch counter-militancy offensives against the group’s strongholds near the Afghan border in 2014, killing several thousand militants and forcing others to flee across the border into Afghanistan. 

While security measures reduced militant violence in Pakistan for several years, the country has witnessed a resurgence of TTP attacks since the start of 2021. The attacks have killed and injured hundreds of security forces. 

Ban on TLP lifted 

Separately, a radical Islamic party in Pakistan called off weeks of violent street protests Monday a day after the government removed the group from a list of proscribed organizations. 

The government argued in a statement issued late on Sunday the delisting of the Tehrik-e-Labaik Pakistan (TLP), part of a deal that the two sides said was in the “national interest.” 

The deal with the TLP came after seven police officers were killed in clashes during the protest that had originated last month from the eastern city of Lahore with a goal of marching on the capital, Islamabad. 

The TLP was protesting the detention of its leader, arrested in April when the group was outlawed by authorities, and demanding the expulsion of the French ambassador over publication of anti-Islamic caricatures in a French magazine. 

The ultraconservative party in recent years has staged a series of street protests, disrupting public life. 

“The federal government is pleased to remove the name of the Tehrik-e-Labaik Pakistan as a proscribed organization,” the government said in a notification. It added that the decision was made after assurances from the group that it would abide by the law. 

Hundreds of TLP supporters were also released from police detention earlier this month as part of the deal. Party leader Saad Rizvi remains in detention. 

The TLP launched a nationwide campaign in Pakistan against France after Paris-based satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo republished cartoons last year depicting the Prophet Muhammad, an act that Muslims deemed blasphemous. 

 
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At least 89 people, including 17 children, have tested positive for the Zika virus in a surge of cases in the Indian city of Kanpur, its health department said on Monday.

First discovered in 1947, the mosquito-borne virus Zika virus reached epidemic proportions in Brazil in 2015, when thousands of babies were born with microcephaly, a disorder that causes babies to be born with abnormally small heads and underdeveloped brains.

“There has been a surge in cases of the Zika virus and the health department has formed several teams to contain the spread,” Dr. Nepal Singh, chief medical officer of Kanpur district in India’s most populous state of Uttar Pradesh, told Reuters.

“There is one woman who is pregnant, and we are paying special attention towards her.”

Cases have been reported in several Indian states in recent years, though Amit Mohan Prasad, Uttar Pradesh’s top government bureaucrat for health and family welfare, told Reuters this was the first outbreak in the state.

The first Zika case in the industrial city of Kanpur was detected on Oct. 23 and the number of cases has increased over the past week.

“People are testing positive because we are doing very aggressive contact tracing,” said Prasad. Authorities were increasing their surveillance of the outbreak and eliminating breeding grounds for the mosquitoes that transmit the virus, Singh said.
…

Indian police are seeking the owners of around 100 social media accounts accused of sharing “fake news” after mob attacks on mosques in the country’s northeast. New Delhi,

Last month’s violence in Tripura state erupted on the sidelines of a rally for hundreds of followers of a right-wing Hindu nationalist group. 

The incident appeared to be a revenge attack prompted by the killing of several Hindu worshippers across the border in Muslim-majority Bangladesh. 

Four mosques were vandalized and several Muslim-owned homes and businesses were ransacked. 

According to police, people aiming to whip up further violence shared misleading images on social media after the incident. 

“The accounts identified were spreading rumors, fake news, fake videos and fake photographs that were not even linked to Tripura,” a senior police officer in the state told AFP on Sunday, on condition of anonymity.

“It is still too early, but everyone will be identified and arrested for such fabrications.” 

A police report released to the media on Saturday identified 102 posts that it said were published by “unknown miscreants” to provoke conflict between “people of differing religious communities”. 

Local media reports said police had written to Facebook, Twitter and YouTube to demand the posts be removed. 

Much of the offending posts had been removed by Sunday and AFP could not determine their content.

Those that remained online largely appeared to be highlighting the plight of Muslims targeted in the attacks.

“Tripura is burning!” read a post by an Indian journalist based in New Delhi, which was published on the day of the incident without accompanying photos or footage and highlighted in the police document. 

Last month’s attacks put the state on high alert, with security forces guarding mosques and police banning gatherings of more than four people. 

Tripura is ruled by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party. 

Leaders of India’s minority Muslim community say they have increasingly been subject to attacks and threats, with little opportunity for official recourse, since the Hindu nationalist party came to power in 2014.

“The state government is yet to initiate any big action against those who perpetrated violence,” said a statement from a coalition of Indian Muslim groups on Saturday.

“Those police officers who did not prevent the violence should also be subject to enquiry and action must be taken against them,” it added.

 
…

The Taliban-run Afghan public health ministry announced Sunday the start of a four-day nationwide polio vaccination campaign aimed at inoculating children younger than 5.

For the past three years before taking control of Afghanistan, the Taliban had barred U.N.-organized vaccination teams from doing door-to-door campaigns in parts of the country under their control. The group apparently was suspicious the team members could be spies for the previous government or the West.

Because of the ban and ongoing fighting, some 3.3 million children over the past three years have not been vaccinated.

“Without any doubt polio is a disease that without treatment will either kill our children or cause them with permanent disability, so in this case the only way is to implement the vaccination,” said Dr. Qalandar Ebad, the Taliban’s acting public health minister.

Afghanistan and neighboring Pakistan are the only countries in the world where polio remains endemic, and the disease can cause partial paralysis in children. Since 2010, the country has been carrying out regular inoculation campaigns in which workers go door to door, giving the vaccine to children. Most of the workers are women, since they can get better access to mothers and children.

The four-day campaign will start Monday and take place countrywide, Ebad said. The estimated target population is Afghanistan’s 10 million children younger than 5, including the more than 3.3 million who could not be reached since 2018.

“Vaccination of [children] less than five years of age in the country during the national immunization days is a gigantic task. It is not possible for the ministry of public health alone to complete this task successfully, so we need the support of all lined departments,” said Nek Wali Shah Momin, a health ministry official in the polio eradication department.

The Taliban’s reported endorsement of the campaign appeared aimed at showing the international community they are willing to cooperate with international agencies. The longtime militant insurgent force has been trying to win the world’s recognition of its new government and reopen the door for international aid to rescue the crumbling economy.

The World Health Organization and the U.N. children’s agency UNICEF in a joint statement last month said they welcomed the decision by the Taliban leadership supporting the resumption of house-to-house polio vaccinations across the country.

Large sections of the country have been out of reach for vaccinations in recent years. In parts of the south, particularly, the ban by the Taliban was in effect. In other areas, door-to-door campaigns were impossible because of fighting between the government and insurgents, or because of fears of kidnappings or roadside bombs. In some places, hardline clerics spoke out against vaccinations, calling them un-Islamic or claiming they were part of a Western plot. 
…

Taliban authorities have confirmed the arrest of two men for their suspected role in the killings of four women, including a rights activist, whose bodies were found in a house last week in northern Afghanistan.

An interior ministry spokesman in Kabul Saturday said the detainees had confessed in preliminary interrogation to inviting the victims to the house in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif.

Qari Sayed Khosti did not say whether the suspects also admitted to the killings nor did he identify the victims or a motive. “Further investigations are underway and the case has been referred to court,” Khosti said in a video statement released via Twitter.

The slain activist was identified as Frozan Safi, a 29-year-old university lecturer in Mazar-i-Sharif. She had been desperate to leave the country after the Islamist Taliban took over Afghanistan in August, said Sayed Azim Sadat, director of the Zainuddin Mohammad Babar Cultural Center, where Safi worked.

Sadat told the Associated Press that Safi left her home about three weeks ago to meet someone who claimed he could facilitate her evacuation from Afghanistan. The other three women reportedly also had received a similar offer and were invited to the same house, only to later be found dead.

The Taliban’s return to power in Afghanistan after waging a 20-year insurgency against the former Western-backed government in Kabul and U.S.-led international forces have raised fears of human rights abuses and reprisals.

A United States-led Western emergency chaotic airlift enabled tens of thousands of people, including civil society activists and foreign nationals, to leave Afghanistan before the departure of American and NATO troops from the country at the end of August.

Taliban leaders have not blocked Afghans with valid passports and visas from leaving the country and repeatedly have reassured the global community they would protect the rights of all Afghans, including women and minorities, in line with Islamic laws.

But critics remain skeptical whether the Taliban will live up to their public pledges.

In a new report released this week, Human Rights Watch said Taliban-imposed limits on women working as aid workers are blocking the delivery of badly needed humanitarian assistance in much of Afghanistan.

In the majority of the country’s provinces, women aid workers are only able to work if they are accompanied by a male family member, the watchdog said. Only three of the country’s 34 provinces allow women aid workers to work unconditionally.

“The Taliban should immediately permit all aid workers, women and men, to fully do their jobs, or they will be placing even more people at risk,” said Heather Barr, associate women’s rights director at Human Rights Watch. 

When the Islamist movement last held power from 1996 to 2001, women could not leave their homes unaccompanied, and girls could not receive an education.

The Taliban have reopened secondary schools for boys since taking power in August, but they have prevented most girls in Afghanistan from rejoining school — just like they did under the previous Taliban rule.

Taliban officials dismiss concerns they would not let girls receive an education, insisting relevant departments are making arrangements to enable girls to resume educational activities in “a safe and sound environment.”
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Ten patients died Saturday after a fire broke out in a hospital’s COVID-19 ward in the western Indian state of Maharashtra, officials said. 

An official told New Delhi Television that around 17 patients were in the ward in the city of Ahmednagar when the fire broke out. The remaining patients have been moved to a COVID-19 ward in another hospital, district collector Rajendra Bhosle said. 

While the fire has since been brought under control, the cause was not immediately clear, he added, saying officials will carry out an investigation.

The former chief minister of the state, Devendra Fadnavis, took to Twitter to express his condolences and called for “strict action” against those responsible.

Such incidents are not uncommon in India. In May, when the country was battling a devastating surge in coronavirus cases, a fire in a COVID-19 ward in western India killed at least 18 patients. 

Poor maintenance and lack of proper firefighting equipment often cause deaths in India.
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Pakistan is engaging in peace talks with the outlawed militant alliance known as the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) in an effort to steer them away from years of anti-state violence, according to unnamed officials who are playing down the significance of negotiations in its early stages. 

Multiple officials in Islamabad confirmed Friday the dialogue is ongoing in Afghanistan, and that the neighboring country’s new Taliban rulers are aiding the process. 

“It is ongoing. Nothing concrete as of now,” one of the sources, who asked that his name be withheld to speak candidly, told VOA. 

Another source said the process is aimed at bringing TTP “foot soldiers who are not involved in serious crimes against the state” back into Pakistan’s constitutional and legal framework. A proposed amnesty for the militants also is under consideration in line with the country’s constitution, they added. 

Pakistan’s national security adviser, Moeed Yusuf, defended the negotiations Thursday while speaking to a virtual event at the Washington-based Middle East Institute. He said the Pakistani government previously had also undertaken such initiatives. 

“All states should talk, and if there are ways to bring your own citizens back into the fold of normal legal structures and bounds and constitution, we should,” Yusuf said. 

But the adviser played down the media hype around the peace talks with TTP. 

“I think it has been taken out of proportion. There isn’t any mega-negotiation project as such,” Yusuf said. 

“There has been a change in Afghanistan, and we want to see whether better sense will prevail,” the Pakistani adviser continued, adding that he hopes the TTP “will realize that there is a constitution of Pakistan, [that] there is a legal structure within which, if they want to operate, they will actually be better off.” 

Confidence-building measures 

The English-language Dawn newspaper reported Friday that “a tentative understanding” had been reached between the two sides, requiring TTP to declare a countrywide truce in return for the release of an unknown number of their prisoners from Pakistani jails “as part of confidence-building measures.” 

The monthlong truce would come into effect once the prisoners are released, possibly paving the ground for a “broader peace agreement” to end nearly two decades of militant violence in Pakistan, the paper quoted its sources as saying. 

Last month, Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan revealed for the first time in a television interview his government had been engaged in talks with “some groups” within TTP, saying Afghanistan was hosting the process and Taliban rulers there were acting as mediators.

The Pakistani militant alliance responded by denying Khan’s assertion that the two sides were in negotiations; neither the Afghan Taliban nor TTP militants have since commented on the negotiations. 

Years of violence, failed negotiations 

Tens of thousands of Pakistanis, including security forces, have died in terrorist attacks claimed by the Pakistani Taliban since the group emerged in 2007. 

Failed talks with the TTP prompted Pakistan to launch counter-militancy offensives against the group’s strongholds near the Afghan border in 2014, killing several thousand militants and forcing others to flee across the border into Afghanistan. 

While security measures reduced militant violence in Pakistan for several years, the country has witnessed a resurgence of TTP attacks since the start of 2021, which have killed and injured hundreds of security forces. 

Islamabad had strained diplomatic ties with the Western-backed former Afghan government that collapsed in the face of the stunning Taliban victories that enabled the Islamist movement to seize control of Kabul in August. 

Pakistan consistently accused the previous Afghan rulers of sheltering fugitive TTP leaders and helping them to orchestrate cross-border terrorist attacks against Pakistan. Pakistan’s alleged support for the Afghan Taliban is believed to have played a role in helping the insurgent group wage and sustain attacks against the former Kabul government forces, as well as U.S.-led foreign troops in Afghanistan over the past 20 years — charges Islamabad denies. 

Sirajuddin Haqqani, the interior minister of the Taliban’s interim government in Afghanistan, is said to be acting as a mediator in Pakistan’s peace talks with TTP. He heads the notorious Haqqani network of militants designated as a global terrorist by the U.S. He himself is wanted by the U.S. and carries a bounty of $10 million for information leading to his arrest. 

The Afghan Taliban interior minister allegedly maintains ties with the Pakistani spy agency and the TTP, which is designated as a global terrorist group by Washington and the United Nations. 

Critics say Pakistan’s long-running support for the Taliban has prompted Islamabad to seek payback by pressing the acting Kabul government to help in containing TTP-led violence. 

 
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Taliban-imposed limits on women working as aid workers are holding up the delivery of badly needed assistance in much of Afghanistan, Human Rights Watch says. 

In the majority of the country’s provinces, women aid workers are only able to work if they are accompanied by a male family member, the group says. Only three of the country’s 34 provinces allow women aid workers to work unconditionally. 

Mandating an escort effectively makes it impossible for most women to work, the rights group says. 

“The Taliban’s severe restrictions on women aid workers are preventing desperately needed lifesaving aid from reaching Afghans, especially women, girls, and women-headed households,” said Heather Barr, associate women’s rights director at Human Rights Watch. 

“Permitting women aid workers to do their jobs unfettered is not a matter of agencies or donors placing conditions on humanitarian assistance, but an operational necessity for delivering that assistance.” 

Women who are able to work are often restricted to “health and education programs,” Human Rights Watch said. In an office setting, men and women are segregated, effectively leaving women unable to provide input when decisions are made. 

Another problem, according to the group, is that rules covering women aid workers are seldom laid out in writing. The group said only five provinces have provided rules in written form. “The rest of the agreements allowing women aid workers are oral,” the group said. 

“The Taliban should immediately permit all aid workers, women and men, to fully do their jobs, or they will be placing even more people at risk,” Barr said. 

When the Taliban last held power, women could not leave their homes unaccompanied, and girls could not receive an education. 
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Pakistan is one of the most vulnerable countries to climate change in the world. In order to defend against the destructive effects of a warming planet, the government plans to plant 10 billion trees by 2023. Shahzeb Jillani reports from District Mansehra in northern Pakistan.
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Indian police have detained or arrested at least a dozen Muslims for allegedly celebrating Pakistan’s cricket match victory October 24 over archrival India in the T20 World Cup.  

Those arrested include a Muslim teacher in the western state of Rajasthan who was fired from her job for writing “We won” on her WhatsApp status following Pakistan’s crushing victory against India last week in Dubai. Authorities at a government hospital in Indian-administered Kashmir also terminated the job contract of a Kashmiri Muslim medical technician after she allegedly celebrated the victory on social media. 

In the northern state of Uttar Pradesh, seven people, including three Kashmiri students, were arrested for celebrating Pakistan’s victory. The state’s chief minister said all would be charged with sedition, and the accused could face jail terms of up to seven years. 

Former Indian Supreme Court Justice Deepak Gupta said the celebration by any Indian of Pakistan’s cricket victory is “definitely not sedition and it is ridiculous to think it is.” 

India and Pakistan are cricket-frenzy nations, and the neighbors have been fierce rivals on the pitch since British India was split into two countries in 1947.  

But because of the bitter political enmity between the countries, the Indian government does not allow the Indian cricket team to play Pakistan except in an official International Cricket Council-organized contest such as the ongoing T20 World Cup in the United Arab Emirates. 

India accuses Pakistan of sponsoring terrorism in India and has blamed its rival for many terrorist attacks in India-administered Kashmir and other parts of the country. While Pakistan denies the accusations, almost all exchanges between the nations have come to a standstill in the recent years. The bilateral cricketing ties between the two neighbors have been frozen for more than eight years.

Pakistan’s trouncing of archrival India in the October 24 match triggered ecstatic celebrations among some Muslims in India, according to police reports. In India, where the majority is Hindu, those celebrating Pakistan’s victory are viewed as anti-nationals or enemies of India. 

On October 27, police arrested Muslim teacher Nafisa Attari in Rajasthan’s Udaipur for her WhatsApp status in support of the Pakistani cricket team. The private school where she worked dismissed her immediately.  

The same day, police in Uttar Pradesh announced they had arrested seven people, including three Kashmiri students from a private engineering college in Agra, for allegedly celebrating Pakistani team’s victory on WhatsApp. The Kashmiris were suspended from school. 

In a tweet, Uttar Pradesh police said those arrested were “anti-national elements” who used “disrespectful words against the Indian cricket team and made anti-India comments which disrupted peace.” The Kashmiris also face charges of cyberterrorism, under India’s Information Technology Act.  

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath threatened that Indians found cheering Pakistani cricket team will face tough actions.  

Adityanath tweeted: “Those celebrating Pakistan’s victory will face sedition charges.” 

The charge of sedition, which is based on a British colonial-era law, can be used against anyone who “brings or attempts to bring into hatred or contempt, or excites or attempts to excite disaffection towards, the Government established by law.”   

Nasir Khuehami, national spokesperson of the Jammu and Kashmir Students Association, told VOA that Kashmiri Muslim students were violently assaulted in many states in India for allegedly celebrating the Pakistani cricket team’s victory.  

“This is perhaps true that those Kashmiri students celebrated Pakistani team’s victory in social media. But the Kashmiri students in Agra are being hounded more because of some Hindu groups’ charge that they shouted ‘Pakistan Zindabad’ slogans. This charge is completely untrue. The college authorities and some non-Kashmiri students from the Agra engineering college confirmed it to us that no Kashmiri students shouted anti-India or pro-Pakistan slogans. But mostly because of the bogus charge, the students are being viewed as anti-nationalists,” Khuehami said.  

In the presence of police, Hindu right-wing groups beat up three arrested Kashmiri students while they were being produced in the court, Khuehami said.   

“Several lawyer associations in Agra have decided not to provide legal support to the three Kashmiri students. It is obvious that once the three students are booked under sedition charges, their studies will be doomed. Slapping sedition charges against the students just on the basis of their WhatsApp statuses and congratulatory messages is an arbitrary and unwarranted act.” 

The parents of the three students, who are mostly poor, have urged that the Uttar Pradesh government forgive them and revoke all the charges on humanitarian grounds.    

In a video interview, Gupta said celebrating the Pakistani team’s victory over India may be offensive or unwise for an Indian “but it is not a crime. It is not illegal. A thing may be good or bad, but that does not make it a crime or illegal.” 
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As the Taliban shift their focus from insurgency to government, their most formidable rival is the Islamic State’s regional chapter, which has staged a string of bloody attacks in recent weeks.

The latest atrocity claimed by Islamic State-Khorasan, also known as ISIS-K, killed at least 19 people Tuesday, including a senior Taliban commander at a military hospital in Kabul, with dozens more wounded.

It followed the slaughter of scores of Shiite Muslims at a mosque last month, and a suicide bombing that killed more than 100 people, including 13 U.S. soldiers, as American troops evacuated in August.

Here is a look at the rivalry between the two groups:

What is IS-Khorasan?

The Islamic State group came to prominence when it proclaimed a caliphate in Syria in 2014.

It inspired a number of offshoots elsewhere, including in “Khorasan,” a historical region taking in parts of modern-day Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan and Turkmenistan.

Jean-Luc Marret, of the Foundation for Strategic Research, a French think tank, describes IS-Khorasan as “a conglomeration of former jihadist organizations, including Uyghurs and Uzbeks, and Taliban defectors.”

According to U.N. estimates, IS-Khorasan has between 500 and a few thousand fighters in northern and eastern Afghanistan, including cells under the nose of the Taliban in the capital, Kabul.

Since 2020, the group has reputedly been led by Shahab al-Muhajir, whose nom de guerre suggests he arrived in the region from the Arab world, but his origins remain murky.

He is variously rumored to have been an al-Qaida commander or a former member of the Haqqani network, one of the most powerful and feared factions in the Taliban.

How great is the threat?

IS-Khorasan has been responsible for some of the deadliest attacks in the region in recent years, massacring civilians in Afghanistan and Pakistan, at mosques, shrines, public squares and even hospitals.

The group has especially targeted Muslims from sects it considers heretical, including Shiites, much like the original IS group.

It was hit hard by both the Taliban and U.S.-led forces and was losing influence, but its attacks have ramped up since their rival Islamists took power in August.

According to researcher Abdul Sayed of online extremism tracker ExTrac, al-Muhajir placed “a renewed emphasis on urban warfare and symbolic violence.”

Where did the rivalry begin?

Many IS-Khorasan fighters fought for the Taliban or allied groups, or came from insurgent movements inspired by al-Qaida.

While both the Taliban and IS-Khorasan are hardline Sunni Islamist militants, they differ on strategy and interpretation of religion, while claiming to be the true flag bearers of jihad.

Despite a history of targeting Shiites, the Taliban have now pledged to protect them. IS-Khorasan, however, remains bent on eradicating groups it considers apostates.

The Taliban of 2021 aim to rule Afghanistan under their interpretation of Islamic law, whereas IS-Khorasan is still wedded to the goal of a global caliphate.

While differences run deep, the border between the groups is porous, and fighters can shift sides as their commanders’ views and opportunities evolve.

“ISIS-K has been previously successful in recruiting members disaffected with the Taliban and those who perceive the Taliban as too moderate,” said Barbara Kelemen, of Dragonfly Security Intelligence.

“With the Taliban now seemingly implementing some moderate reforms … there is a high probability [IS-Khorasan] will try to capitalize.”

Are the Taliban equipped to fight back?

Afghanistan’s ousted U.S.-backed government received hundreds of billions of dollars in support and security assistance but could defeat neither the Taliban nor IS-Khorasan.

Now the Taliban face IS-Khorasan with very little outside assistance and none of the sophisticated intelligence gathering and surveillance deployed by foreign militaries.

They know their enemy and the terrain, though, and last month announced the destruction of an IS-Khorasan cell in Kabul after a suicide attack.

And they have the potential support of two groups that know IS-Khorasan’s tactics very well.

As a report from the U.S.-based Soufan Center said, if the Taliban are to fight ISIS-K, they will have to “rely on the Haqqani network, al-Qaida and other violent nonstate actors for manpower, combat expertise and logistical support.”
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A plane chartered by the U.N. refugee agency carrying desperately needed winter relief for thousands of displaced people landed in the Afghan capital, Kabul, Tuesday.

This is the first of three mercy flights scheduled to take off from UNHCR’s warehouse in Dubai for Kabul this week. The planeload of 33 tons of winterization kits will be distributed to thousands of families living under precarious conditions.

Conflict and insecurity have displaced 3.5 million Afghans inside the country, including some 700,000 newly displaced this year. U.N. refugee agency spokeswoman Shabia Mantoo says her agency aims to aid half a million of this large number of displaced.

She says aid is prioritized based on needs and vulnerabilities. She says the UNHCR is rushing to provide critical aid to the Afghans before the rigors of winter set in and access is cut off.

“Already, they are feeling the onset of the cold, with temperatures dipping to even zero degrees Celsius overnight,” Mantoo said. “So, quite cold. People have very rudimentary or basic setup, especially those that have just been displaced. It is quite critical, and that is why there is an urgency to get this winter assistance in. In the highlands and the upper parts of the country, we are expecting even more temperatures to zip even more.”  

Mantoo says the winter relief supplies include emergency shelter kits, items to improve tent insulation against the cold and heat resistant protection to enable the installation of a stove. She says humanitarian aid, including food rations, blankets, kitchen sets and solar panels, also are being distributed.  

“We are using land, sea and air routes to bring humanitarian relief into Afghanistan and other countries in the region so we can respond to increasing needs,” Mantoo said. “Further relief supplies have also been prepositioned in Termez, Uzbekistan, ready to be trucked into Afghanistan as needed.”  

The UNHCR is appealing for greater international support. It says more resources are urgently needed as it scales up its humanitarian response to reach all who will need help to survive the harsh winter ahead.

So far, the agency’s $388 million appeal remains 42% underfunded.
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Pakistan is to free more than 2,000 jailed activists of a banned Islamist militant group and allow the movement to contest elections, under a deal with the government struck to end weeks of violent clashes, negotiators on both sides said. 

In return, the Tehrik-e-Labaik Pakistan (TLP) has agreed to shun the politics of violence and withdraw its longstanding demand to have France’s ambassador expelled over the publication of caricatures of the Prophet Mohammad by a French satirical magazine, they told Reuters on condition of anonymity. 

The caricatures have triggered repeated demonstrations by the group to protest what it considers blasphemy. 

Prime Minister Imran Khan’s government banned the TLP after its protests turned violent earlier this year, designated it a terrorist group and arrested its chief Saad Rizvi. 

The government and the movement recently said they had reached an agreement to help end the clashes, but neither side gave details. 

Two members of the TLP’s negotiating team and one from the government side told Reuters the centerpiece of the deal was to lift the ban and allow the group to contest elections. 

“The state has acknowledged that the TLP is neither a terrorist group nor a banned outfit,” another member of the TLP negotiation team, Bashir Farooqi, separately told local Dunya News TV. 

In addition, the government has agreed not to contest the release of the group’s jailed leader as well as nearly 2,300 activists and to remove their names from a terrorist watch list, the three negotiators told Reuters. 

Punjab province Law Minister Raja Basharat said nearly 1,000 of the activists had already been released. 

Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry did not respond to a request for comment. 

The settlement came after seven police officers were killed and hundreds more were wounded as they confronted thousands of TLP demonstrators marching up Pakistan’s busiest highway from the eastern city of Lahore to the capital Islamabad. 

The group, which can mobilize thousands of supporters, was born in 2015 out of a protest campaign to seek the release of a police guard who assassinated a provincial governor in 2011 over his calls to reform blasphemy legislation. 

It entered politics in 2017 and surprised the political elite by securing over 2 million votes in the 2018 election. 

The next national election is scheduled for 2023, and analysts expect political groups to start gearing up early next year. 

Despite the agreement, TLP demonstrators have refused to clear the Grand Trunk Road highway, which they have blocked for more than two weeks, until the government showed good progress on the agreement, its leaders said. 

 
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Afghanistan had a vibrant media when the Taliban took over the country in August. Among the multitude of diverse channels was one run by women. That channel is now folding due to Taliban threats and censorship. But the woman who was the driving force behind it refuses to give up. VOA’s Ayesha Tanzeem spent time with her in Kabul. This is her story.

Contributor: Mariam Alimi
Camera: Malik Waqar Ahmed
Producer: Malik Waqar Ahmed/Rod James
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A group of gunmen, reportedly including suicide bombers, assaulted Afghanistan’s main military hospital in Kabul Tuesday, killing at least 15 people and wounding many more.

A Taliban security official confirmed the casualties on condition of anonymity.

The official Afghan news agency quoted witnesses as saying “Daesh” was behind the raid. The agency used a local name for the regional affiliate of the Islamic State, known as Islamic State Khorasan Province. It gave no further details.

A spokesman for the Taliban government said the assault began with a powerful explosion at the entrance to the hospital in the Afghan capital’s Wazir Akbar Khan area. A second bomb went off inside the facility, said Bilal Karimi. He promised to share more details later.

Taliban forces were reportedly battling the assailants inside the Sardar Mohammad Dawood Khan hospital. The extent of the casualties was not known immediately nor were there any claims of responsibility for the attack.

There has been an uptick in attacks in Afghanistan by IS-Khorasan since the Taliban took control of the country in mid-August. The violence has mainly targeted Taliban fighters and members of the minority Shi’ite community, killing and injuring hundreds of people.

Islamic State militants stormed the military hospital in 2017 and killed more than two dozen people. The Taliban also had targeted the facility while waging a deadly insurgency against the Western-backed Afghan government and U.S.-led foreign troops.
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Among the thousands of Afghans evacuated to the United States in recent months, several hundred are being relocated to the southeastern state of North Carolina, where preparations are in full swing to help them adjust to new lives in America.

Time is of the essence, according to Marsha Hirsch, executive director of the Carolina Refugee Resettlement Agency (CRRA), based in Charlotte, North Carolina’s largest city.

“It’s always our hope that after the 90 days, someone [a refugee] is employed, so that the case can move forward to financial self-sufficiency, paying their own rent, taking ESL [English as a Second Language] classes, enrolling the children in school,” Hirsch told VOA. “So, we try to accomplish all of those tasks in 90 days.”

Like many refugees, the relocated Afghans fled war and upheaval as the Taliban swiftly came to power in the final days of the U.S. military withdrawal from the country. Unlike most refugees, nearly all Afghan evacuees already had some connection to the United States, having been on U.S. payrolls during America’s 20-year war in Afghanistan or related to someone who was.

“Almost everybody [who] was given this visa [to come to America] had to work with the United States in some capacity, of course with their relatives,” said Omer Omer, director of the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants’ Raleigh, North Carolina field office.

Omer noted that some Afghan evacuees have already arrived in North Carolina, with more to come from U.S. military bases where they have been temporarily housed. Some arrive as family units, others as individuals.

“I expect we’ll start to get larger numbers,” he said. “So, we are really bracing ourselves.”

Adjusting to American life 

Helping Afghans reestablish themselves in the United States requires a holistic approach that begins with a basic need – being able to support themselves and their families.

“We have a full employment program, and we are very big about this one,” Omer said. “We work intensively, analyzing these people [arriving refugees] and finding their potential. First, we want to make sure that they work and pay for their bills, but after that, we come to the next evaluation and in this phase, we allow them to make use of the skills, like gaining a certification for a mid-level technical job or taking extra courses.”

Some challenges Americans are all too familiar with are also stumbling blocks for Afghan evacuees, including housing.

“We are facing housing issues, not affordable housing – housing period. There is no housing!” Omer told VOA. “It is our responsibility to do a good job as a community and prepare them. So in the meantime, finding the capacity of space is one of our biggest challenges.” 

In Charlotte, CRRA is networking with local institutions, including community colleges and companies based in the city. 

“We have relationships with lots of employers where refugees whom we have welcomed find jobs to become self-sufficient. Relatedly, while we don’t offer ESL programs, we partner with the local community college to offer refugees English language lessons,” Hirsch said. “The college also offers a wide variety of programming for gaining certifications in other sectors and ultimately forging career paths for refugees.” 

Community response 

Afghans have arrived at a time of contentious debate regarding U.S.-bound immigration. A majority of North Carolinian voters twice opted for former President Donald Trump, who dramatically cut the number of refugees admitted to the United States. 

But Hirsch sees a welcoming environment for Afghans arriving in the state. 

“I would have to say from our office’s point of view, it hasn’t been our experience that people have been hostile to this process [accepting and resettling Afghan refugees],” she said. On the contrary, she praised “the outpouring of support that has inundated the office, from calls to emails, and people even stopping by with donations.” 

While expressing concerns about uncontrolled migration to America’s southern border, Charlotte resident Karina Gauthier is among those who want to put out the welcome mat for Afghan evacuees, all of whom came to the United States legally.

A mother of two adult children, Gauthier has lived in the Charlotte area for many years and works for a local nonprofit organization.

“In general, I welcome new migrants into the Charlotte area, I believe they make our city more interesting and richer in culture. I’ve recently been thinking about volunteering helping them [Afghans] to adjust, but I have so little time right now,” Gauthier told VOA.

 
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