Food prices rose sharply in Afghanistan during the Taliban’s 48-hour nationwide internet shutdown, with residents and traders in Kabul and Helmand reporting sudden jumps in the cost of basic goods. In Kabul, the price of a sack of flour climbed by about 100 afghanis ($1.50), while rice rose by 150 afghanis ($2.20) and cooking oil by 50 afghanis ($0.70). A […]

A great unanswered question of the second Trump administration has been how its outright rejection of the existing global order would affect China’s international strategy. U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has called this order both “obsolete” and “a weapon being used against” the United States, and in his speech at the United Nations on September 23, President Donald Trump […]

The supplementary economic benefits and perceived acceleration of multipolar trends might appeal to Russia, but the latent military-strategic threats to its interests arguably outweigh them. The “New Rules” telegram channel, which his associated with Sputnik’s former podcast of the same name, posted in late September about plans to revive the Islamabad-Tehran-Istanbul railway. Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian proposed during his trip […]

In July, al-Tazkirah media—an Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS)-affiliated media organization—distributed an online poster calling for Uyghur Muslims to join ISIS and destroy China’s “empire of tyranny.” The ISIS push to specifically recruit Uyghurs underscores its burgeoning alliance with Uyghur jihadi groups such as the Turkestan Islamic Party (TIP; also known as the East Turkestan Islamic Movement)—and likely […]

On June 6, 2025, the notorious Russia-backed Wagner Group announced their imminent withdrawal from Mali. Operating in the Sahelian country for three and a half years, the private military company (PMC) has faced its fair share of criticism from the international security community. In October 2022, CEP discussed the potential challenges of the Wagner Group in Mali. Noting the PMC’s […]

Since the fall of Kabul in 2021, Afghanistan has become a safe haven for a wide range of Islamist terrorist groups. Even those opposing the governing Taliban regime, such as the Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP), have been able to use the mountainous geography to create sanctuaries. By contrast, groups of the al-Qaeda (AQ) network operating in Afghanistan, have gained […]

Attacks Within China TIP’s attacks within China have proven difficult to attribute. Some of this is connected to the proliferation of aliases for TIP, which is further discussed in the next blog. The first attributions were made by Chinese authorities in connection with a spree of violence in the 1990s in Xinjiang. A list of these violent incidents was published […]

A powerful car bomb outside the headquarters of Pakistan’s paramilitary security forces killed at least 10 people on Tuesday and wounded 30 others, authorities said. Before detonating their vehicle, as many as six militants inside the car stepped outside and engaged troops in an intense shootout, according to the police. All six attackers were reported to have been killed. Residents […]

There are few spectacles as grotesque as Gaza under bombardment. But if anything can compete with it in sheer offensiveness, it is the sight of Pakistani generals dusting off their medals, tightening their waistlines, and flying off to Riyadh like underpaid mall cops called in to protect a billionaire’s parking lot. One is a tragedy. The other is a parody. […]

Shanghai veut concurrencer New York, Londres et Zurich et devenir le nouveau gardien des réserves d’or étrangères. Pékin a commencé à inciter activement d’autres pays à acheter des lingots d’or et à les stocker chez eux. Cela pourrait aider la Chine à renforcer le rôle du yuan en tant que monnaie de réserve face au dollar et à créer un […]