Afghanistan Updates: Taliban again postpones govt formation; move coincides with Pak intel chief's surprise visit

Afghanistan Crisis Latest Update

Kabul airport reopens to receive aid, civilian flights to operate soon

Qatar’s ambassador to Afghanistan said a technical team was able to reopen Kabul airport to receive aid and that it would be prepared for civilian flights soon, Al Jazeera reported on Saturday.

The runway at Kabul airport has been repaired in cooperation with authorities in Afghanistan, the ambassador said, according to reports. Two domestic flights were operated from Kabul to the cities of Mazar-i-Sharif and Kandahar.

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Taliban forces lob teargas shells at women-lead protest in Kabul

A number of women rights activists and reporters, who were protesting in Kabul for the second straight day, said that Taliban fighters lobbed tear gas shells on their procession to stop them from marching toward the Afghan Presidential Palace, local news channel Tolo News reported. The report did not clarify if there were any casualties. 

Video: A number of women rights activists and reporters protested for a second day in Kabul on Saturday, and said the protest turned violent as Taliban forces did not allow the protesters to march toward the Presidential Palace. #TOLOnews pic.twitter.com/X2HJpeALvA

— TOLOnews (@TOLOnews) September 4, 2021

Afghanistan Crisis Latest Update

Leaked documents show US pressuring Pakistan to fight terror groups

The Biden administration is quietly pressing Pakistan to cooperate on combating dreaded terrorist groups such as the ISIS-K and Al Qaeda following the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, according to a set of leaked documents and diplomatic cables to a prominent US media outlet.  

The Dawn newspaper quoted Politico on a slew of diplomatic messages exchanged between Washington and Islamabad recently after the Taliban insurgents seized power in neighbouring Afghanistan. 

The messages show that “the Biden administration is quietly pressing Pakistan to cooperate on fighting terrorist groups such as ISIS-Khorasan and Al Qaeda in the wake of the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan,” the Politico, which obtained the sensitive but unclassified cables and other written materials, reported.

In response, Pakistan has hinted that Islamabad deserves more public recognition of its role in helping people now fleeing Afghanistan, even as it has downplayed fears of what Taliban rule of the country could mean," according to the report.

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US building ‘‘small cities’’ at bases for Afghans

US military bases housing Afghanistan evacuees are building their own city-type leadership organizations to deal with sanitation, food and other challenges as the numbers of Afghans coming into the U.S. grows. Air Force General Glen VanHerck, who heads US Northern Command, said there were more than 25,000 Afghan evacuees being housed at the eight bases as of Friday. 

He acknowledged there have been problems as the bases grapple with language, cultural and other issues.

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Taliban ask militants not to shoot unnecessarily after celebratory fire kills 17 in Kabul

“Attention, Mujahidin in Kabul city and all over the country: Avoid firing in the air and give thanks to Allah instead. Weapons and ammunition are in your hands, no one has the right to waste them. Cold bullets are more likely to harm civilians; So don’t shoot unnecessarily,” Taliban spokesperson Zabihulla Mujahid said after reports that celebratory fire mujahids in Kabul killed 17 civillians.

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17 dead, 41 injured in Taliban’s celebratory fire in Kabul, say reports

At least 17 people were killed and 41 wounded in incidents of gun firing on Friday night in Kabul, Tolo News reported citing a hospital. Yesterday, “celebratory gunfire” was heard in Kabul amid conflicting reports over the situation in Panjshir valley where Taliban fighters are fighting rival forces for control of Afghanistan’s final holdout province, Tolo News reported.

Both the rebel and Taliban forces have made contrasting claims regarding control over the remote valley but no credible news source has been able to verify either source’s story. 

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Biden’s unapologetic Afghan exit indicates end of US global cop role

Beyond the trauma of the Kabul evacuation, Joe Biden is pitching a much broader retreat: a halt to using vast military resources to impose order and US values around the planet.

“This decision about Afghanistan is not just about Afghanistan,” Biden said in what many see as a historic speech on Tuesday. “It’s about ending an era of major military operations to remake other countries.”

“Human rights will be at the center of our foreign policy but the way to do that is not through endless military deployments,” he said. “Our strategy has to change.”

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Top Afghan news channel stays on-air despite fear of Taliban

Tolo News continues to stay on air, but like the rest of the country’s TV and radio stations, it now faces a tough and uncertain future under the Taliban, whose return has sent fear coursing through the media.

The Islamist militant group killed and threatened journalists throughout its 20-year insurgency. During their 1996-2001 regime, TV and most entertainment were banned, and there was no media to speak of.

The Taliban takeover “put us in a very, very difficult situation… to continue our work or not,” Lotfullah Najafizada, the director of Tolo News, told AFP in a phone interview. “As a 24/7 news operation, we didn’t even have one hour to take a break and rethink.”

Tolo stayed on because it had a duty to cover the news, he said, and also because it would have been an “almost impossible” task to negotiate a resumption with the Taliban had the network shut down.

The Taliban leadership has asked Afghan media to operate as usual. One official even sat down for an interview with a woman host on Tolo News, keen to convince people that the Taliban will be softer this time around. But many Afghans, including in the media, are not convinced.

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Google locks Afghan government accounts as Taliban seek emails

Google has temporarily locked down an unspecified number of Afghan government email accounts, according to a person familiar with the matter, as fears grow over the digital paper trail left by former officials and their international partners. In the weeks since the Taliban’s swift takeover of Afghanistan from a US-backed government, reports have highlighted how biometric and Afghan payroll databases might be exploited by the new rulers to hunt their enemies.

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EU Minister outlines conditions for engagement with Taliban

European Union officials on Friday listed a set of conditions for defining the EU’s level of engagement with the Taliban as the new rulers of Afghanistan, including respect for human rights and the rule of law. Following the Afghan government’s collapse last month, the 27-nation bloc and its member countries have evacuated their diplomats from Afghanistan. But EU officials have said they are willing to cooperate with the Taliban now that they have returned to power.

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UN to convene meet to decide upon humanitarian assistance for Afghanistan

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres will travel to Geneva to convene a high-level conference on aid for Afghanistan on 13 September, his spokesman said Friday.

“The conference will advocate for a swift scale-up in funding so the lifesaving humanitarian operation can continue, and appeal for full and unimpeded humanitarian access to make sure Afghans continue to get the essential services they need,”  he said in a statement.

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Taliban indicated they’d be reasonable in addressing Indian concerns: Foreign Secretary Shringla

India and the United States are closely watching Pakistan’s actions in Afghanistan, Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla said on Friday. In the limited engagement that India has had with the Taliban, the new Afghan rulers have indicated that they would be reasonable in addressing New Delhi’s concerns, the foreign secretary added.

“Our engagement with them (the Taliban) has been limited. It’s not that we have (had) a robust conversation. But for whatever conversation we’ve had so far, they’ve been sort of. At least, the Taliban seem to indicate that they will be reasonable in the way they handle this,” Shringla said.

He was responding to a question about the recent meeting that India’s Ambassador in Qatar had with a senior Taliban leader in Doha.

Obviously, like us, they’re also watching carefully and we have to watch Pakistan’s actions with a fine-tooth comb, he told a group of Indian reporters

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Taliban sources say last Afghan holdout region falls; resistance denies

Three Taliban sources said the Islamist militia had on Friday seized the Panjshir valley north of Kabul, the last province of Afghanistan holding out against it, although a resistance leader denied it had fallen. “By the grace of Allah Almighty, we are in control of entire Afghanistan. The troublemakers have been defeated and Panjshir is now under our command,” said one Taliban commander. Deafening volleys of celebratory gunfire resounded all over Kabul and Facebook accounts were full of mentions of the fall of Panjshir.

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Who all will be part of Taliban’s ‘inclusive’ govt?

Hamid Karzai and Abdullah Abdullah are unlikely to get space in the Shura but they will remain in some advisory role, the sources said. Women too, are unlikely to be made an active part of the governance council

Other groups like the deadly Haqqani network will get 50% stake in this government, and warlord turned politician Gulbuddin Hekmatyar will also be part of this governing body, but in the second or third layer, the sources said.

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Taliban co-founder Mullah Baradar likely to head new govt, say reports

Taliban co-founder Mullah Baradar will lead a new Afghan government set to be announced shortly, sources in the Islamist group told Reuters on Friday, as its fighters battled forces loyal to the vanquished republic in the Panjshir Valley north of Kabul.

Baradar, who heads the Taliban’s political office, will be joined by Mullah Mohammad Yaqoob, the son of late Taliban co-founder Mullah Omar, and Sher Mohammad Abbas Stanekzai, in senior positions in the government, three sources said.

Haibatullah Akhunzada, the Taliban’s supreme religious leader, will focus on religious matters and governance within the framework of Islam, another Taliban source said.

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Taliban likely to announce interim govt today

The Taliban is likely to announce an interim government today. The announcement was initially likely on Friday after the evening prayers, but the Islamist group — with a brutal past of an extremist regime — delayed announcing its decision amid renewed protests, a fierce fight from anti-Taliban militia in Panjshir and intense international scrutiny.