The UN’s counter-terror committee has said the threat posed by ISIS still exists and that the terror group is “expanding and exploiting” Afghanistan. In its latest report to the UN Security Council on ISIS, the Counter-Terrorism Committee Executive Directorate (CTED) says the group needs to be “closely monitored” following the death of its leader, Muhammad Al Mawla, also known as […]

The Taliban will not allow any more Afghans to be evacuated until the situation improves abroad for those who have already left, their spokesman said Sunday. Families wanting to leave in future would also need a good excuse for doing so, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid told a news conference, adding a promise to allow anyone to go abroad was not […]

Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian has dismissed US claims that its withdrawal from Afghanistan had all been planned, saying given a choice, Washington would not have opted for the “embarrassing” pullout. In an interview with Iran’s Press TV, Amir-Abdollahian said: “You saw how the United States withdrew from Afghanistan after 20 years in such a manner. If the US could […]

The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (IEA) has banned Afghans from being evacuated from their country, saying those who have left are living in “very bad conditions” abroad. IEA spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said on Sunday that more than 50,000 Afghans living in one camp in Qatar face an uncertain future. He said that there were also Afghan families in Turkey, who […]

Guns drawn, half a dozen Taliban fighters crowded into the house of a Kabul laborer Saturday. As a commander watched, his men took knives to the cushions that lined the family’s sitting room, splitting them open and dumping the stuffing onto the floor. Others pulled family photos off shelves and tossed clothing out of closets. “They said they were looking […]

A senior Taliban minister has boasted about “historic” numbers of suicide attacks the Islamist group has carried out, while complaining that the group has yet to be recognised as Afghanistan’s official government by any other country in the world. Muhammad Hanafi, the Taliban’s minister for the propagation of virtue and prevention of vice, appeared in a video broadcast on national […]

Afghanistan transitions into a new phase after the withdrawal of the US forces, the fear of a destabilized Afghanistan and the looming threat of a humanitarian crisis have heightened the potential challenges for the neighboring states. For Pakistan, stability in Afghanistan mean stability in Pakistan. Therefore, Pakistan have not only pledged direct humanitarian assistance but also sensitizing the world to […]

Nation states are habitually doomed to defeat their best interests. Conditions of mad instability are fostered. Arms sales take place, regimes get propped up or abandoned, and the people under them endure and suffer, awaiting the next criminal regime change. Nothing is more counter-intuitive than the effort to isolate, cripple and strangulate the Taliban regime in Afghanistan. For all the […]

The head of Britain’s domestic intelligence service said that Afghanistan is becoming a hotbed for terrorism. A British man was one of two suspected ISIS recruits caught while trying to enter Afghanistan this month. Ken McCallum, the director general of MI5, said the service has evidence of terrorist groups regrouping in Afghanistan and recruits are travelling to join them. In […]

The Taliban are creating a “grand army” for Afghanistan that will include officers and troops who served the old regime, the official tasked with overseeing the military’s transformation said Monday. Latifullah Hakimi, head of the Taliban’s Ranks Clearance Commission, also told a news conference they had repaired half the 81 helicopters and planes supposedly rendered unserviceable by US-led forces during […]