Category Archives: Taliban

Why not all Islamist extremists are buoyed by the Taliban’s victory

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Analysis: deep fault lines, especially with Isis, may counter Afghanistan’s propaganda advantage for jihadists

Few doubt that the Taliban victory in Afghanistan will give violent Islamist extremists across the world an historic boost, encouraging them in their campaigns to overthrow and replace local regimes – but it has also revealed the deep fault lines that have weakened the jihadist movement in the past decade.

Sunni militants in the Middle East and beyond have already made clear they believe the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan vindicates their own strategies and ideology. Coming just weeks before the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, events in Kabul have a powerful resonance. Many statements have been jubilant.

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Afghanistan: chaos and gunshots outside Kabul airport amid evacuations – video report

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Tens of thousands of foreigners and Afghans who collaborated with US and Nato forces remain stranded in Kabul, as governments grappled with an overwhelming backlog of visas and Taliban checkpoints that were preventing people safely reaching the airport. US troops and Taliban fighters have opened fire into the air to disperse crowds held up outside the airport as they attempt to escape the country

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UK wrestles with effects of Taliban rule on terror, drugs and aid

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Analysis: whether Britain should recognise Afghanistan’s new regime, and how soon, is a fraught question for officials

With the Taliban now firmly in control of most of Afghanistan, British government figures have been wrestling with what that means for everything from counter-terrorism to the drugs trade and aid.

How soon should Britain’s battlefield foes be recognised as the de facto rulers of Afghanistan? What attitude should the UK take to the burgeoning resistance coalescing around former Afghan government figures as the threat of renewed civil war looms?

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As I walk around Kabul, the streets are empty of women

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A few days ago the capital was full of women going about their business. Now, the few that remain walk fast and full of fear

Four days after the quick and unexpected invasion of Kabul by the Taliban, the streets of the Afghan capital are almost entirely devoid of women.

The few women who are on the streets are wearing the traditional blue burqa, Islamic garb that, while customary in Afghanistan, was not used as widely in Kabul until now. Many women are dressed in the long black clothes commonly worn in the Middle East and Arab nations.

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Biden says US troops may stay in Afghanistan past 31 August deadline – video

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Joe Biden says US troops may remain in Afghanistan past 31 August as it continues to evacuate US citizens. Biden told ABC News: "If there’s American citizens left, we’re going to stay until we get them all out." The comments came after Biden denied the withdrawal of troops could have been handled better. Large crowds continue to arrive at Kabul's airport, creating a logistical hurdle as countries try to evacuate citizens. The US says it is unable to escort citizens to the airport but can continue to secure airstrip, enabling flights to take off

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Taliban face financial crisis without access to foreign reserves

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Analysis: As the US freezes Afghan reserves and Germany halts aid, the new rulers may find they are far short of what is required to govern

Afghanistan’s new Taliban rulers are likely to face a rapidly developing financial crisis, with foreign currency reserves largely unreachable and western aid donors – who fund the country’s institutions by about 75% – already cutting off or threatening to cut payments.

While the hardline Islamist group has moved in recent years to become more independent of outside financial supporters including Iran, Pakistan and wealthy donors in the Gulf, its financial flows – amounting to $1.6bn (£1.2bn) last year – are far short of what it will require to govern.

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What could Taliban rule mean for Afghanistan? – video explainer

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Afghanistan's government collapsed as the Taliban militant group took control of all of the country's major cities in only nine days, including Kabul, the capital of more than 4 million people.

The Guardian’s senior international correspondent Emma Graham-Harrison explains how the Taliban took control so quickly and what this could mean for the future of the country

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US says ‘we’re not taking their word for it’ on Taliban airport safety promise – video

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White House press secretary Jen Psaki says the Biden administration does not have complete faith in the Taliban promise to offer a safe passage to Kabul's international airport after their takeover of the country. 'We're not trusting, we're not taking their word for it,' Psaki says. 'We are watching closely.' Asked what the consequences of breaking the promise could be, Psaki says: 'The consequences are the full weight and force of the United States military, and I think we've made that clear'

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Women’s rights will be respected ‘within the limits of Islam’, say Taliban – video

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The Taliban said they wanted peaceful relations with other countries and would respect the rights of women 'within the limits of Islam', as they held their first press conference since seizing Kabul. During their rule between 1996 and 2001, the Taliban implemented their own strict interpretation of sharia law, preventing women from working and girls from going to school.

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‘There was never a good time’: was Biden’s Afghanistan speech fair or accurate?

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Analysis: US president’s TV address blamed others for the Taliban takeover and tried to distance himself from past administrations

In a televised speech on Monday, Joe Biden defended his decision to withdraw US forces from Afghanistan and his handling of a crisis that has seen the Taliban capture the country in a lightning offensive. Blaming Afghan politicians and the country’s security forces for the calamitous collapse, he also sought to distance himself from previous administrations. But how much of it was fair or even accurate?

Biden: We went to Afghanistan almost 20 years ago with clear goals: get those who attacked us on September 11, 2001, and make sure al-Qaida could not use Afghanistan as a base from which to attack us again. We did that. We severely degraded al-Qaida in Afghanistan. We never gave up the hunt for Osama bin Laden and we got him.

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Dominic Raab says no one predicted Taliban takeover of Afghanistan – video

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It was impossible to predict the Taliban would retake Afghanistan so swiftly after the withdrawal of international troops, Dominic Raab has said, arguing: ‘No one saw this coming.’

Speaking to the media following his return from holiday, after chaotic and deadly scenes at Kabul airport on Sunday, the UK foreign secretary said US and British troops had stabilised the airport, allowing evacuations to resume


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Evacuations continue in Afghanistan – in pictures

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Following the Taliban’s military takeover of the country, westerners continue to leave. Afghans hoping to escape Taliban rule have gathered in Kabul, with many making desperate attempts to flee. There was chaos at the airport, where troops used guns and helicopters to clear the runways, and several people died in frantic last-minute attempts to escape by clinging to departing planes

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‘Chilling reports’: UN chief urges security council to act on Afghanistan – video

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United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres called on the security council to 'use all tools at its disposal to suppress the global terrorist threat in Afghanistan' and guarantee that basic human rights will be respected. Ashraf Ghani left Afghanistan on Sunday as the Taliban took over the country 20 years after they were ousted by a US-led invasion. 'We are receiving chilling reports of severe restrictions on human rights throughout the country,' said Guterres. 'I am particularly concerned by accounts of mounting human rights violations against the women and girls of Afghanistan'.

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‘Was it worth it?’: veterans of Afghan conflict reel at Taliban takeover

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Former soldiers express anger and heartbreak as service in 20-year war rendered ‘pointless’

As chaotic scenes unfolded more than 4,000 miles away in Kabul, veterans of the 20-year conflict and families who lost loved ones on the battlefield have been asking the stark question: “Was it worth it?”

“There is a generation of Afghans who have been given a taste of what freedom is like, so you never know, but it feels pretty bleak at the moment,” said Andrew Fox, a former major in the Parachute Regiment who served on three tours of Afghanistan and who has spoken openly about the impact of PTSD on his own health.

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China will tread carefully in navigating the Taliban’s return

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Analysis: Difficult to predict how China will deal with its volatile neighbour, but Uyghur issue could prove contentious

The US’s hasty departure from Afghanistan has provided much material for China’s propaganda agencies to discredit Washington’s foreign policy. But Beijing is also treading a careful line in navigating an increasingly uncertain security situation in one of its most volatile neighbours.

On Monday, Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson, Hua Chunying, said that while Beijing will “continue developing good-neighbourly, friendly and cooperative relations with Afghanistan”, it also urges the Taliban to “ensure that all kinds of terrorism and crimes can be curbed so that the Afghan people can stay away from war and rebuild their homeland”.

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The Taliban leaders in line to become de facto rulers of Afghanistan

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The task facing the new head of state will be more challenging than 1996. But who is in the running for a governing role?

Last time the Taliban seized power in Afghanistan – in 1996 – there was never any question of what form of government they would install and who would rule the country. They were filling a vacuum, and Mullah Mohammed Omar, the reclusive cleric who had led the movement since its beginnings two years earlier, took charge.

Then, Kabul was a shattered husk, with a tiny hungry, scared population, almost no economic activity, no telephones and public transport provided by ancient Russian-made cars or 1970s buses once driven from Germany. The Taliban could impose whatever they wanted.

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How the Taliban took Afghanistan

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The departure of US forces was followed by a rout of Afghan government forces. Now, after 20 years of western intervention, Afghanistan is back under the control of the Taliban

It began with a steady trickle of military defeats. First Afghan government control was ceded to the Taliban in provincial towns and cities. Then, as the lack of resistance became apparent, bigger cities and regional capitals began to fall. Finally on Sunday the Taliban entered Kabul as the western-backed government fled the country.

The Guardian’s senior international correspondent, Emma Graham-Harrison, tells Michael Safi that it marks a stunning reversal for the Afghan government, which had begun negotiating a deal with the Taliban in recent months. And as deeply flawed as the government in Kabul has been for the past 20 years, it has created space for the education of girls and a free press. All of that is now in grave doubt as Afghans wait to see whether their new Taliban rulers plan to carry on where they left off in 2001. We hear voices from inside Afghanistan including reporter Zahra Joya, who was a child when US forces invaded in 2001 and drove out the Taliban. She describes her fears for what will come next.

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‘I stand squarely behind my decision’: defiant Biden defends withdrawal from Afghanistan – video

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Joe Biden defended his decision to withdraw all US troops from Afghanistan even after Taliban forces took Kabul, saying: 'I stand squarely behind my decision.' Striking a defiant tone, the US president admitted the situation in the country had deteriorated faster than anticipated, but said it showed there would never be a good time to withdraw US forces. 'American troops cannot and should not be dying in a war that Afghan forces are not willing to fight for themselves,' Biden said. 'We gave them every chance to determine their own future; we could not provide them with the will to fight for that future.'

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Raab: pace of Taliban takeover ‘caught everyone by surprise’ – video

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Britain will use all the means at its disposal, including sanctions and diplomacy, to hold the Taliban to account in Afghanistan, foreign secretary Dominic Raab said.

In his first public appearance since the crisis began, Raab said that 'everyone was caught by surprise by the pace and the scale of the Taliban takeover', in which Kabul fell to the Islamist group over the weekend. Britain, which had initially committed 600 members of the armed forces to evacuate British nationals and former British staff, will shortly have 900 troops in Kabul.

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Swift Taliban takeover proves US and UK analysis badly wrong

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Analysis: Joe Biden and Boris Johnson five weeks ago claimed Afghan government would not fall so easily

Joe Biden could not have been clearer: a Taliban takeover of Afghanistan was “not inevitable”, the US president said on 8 July. Boris Johnson, the UK prime minister, was equally confident – “there is no military path to victory for the Taliban” – he told MPs earlier that day, five weeks ago.

The president said he trusted “the capacity of the Afghan military”, who were better trained, better equipped and “more competent in terms of conducting war”. The prime minister agreed: “I do not believe that the Taliban are guaranteed the kind of victory that we sometimes read about.”

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