Category Archives: Afghanistan

Trump’s military meddling fuels growing tension with leadership

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Amid strategic U-turns and elevation of war crimes defendants, president’s military support weakens – but Fox pundits back him

On Thursday night, a besuited Donald Trump appeared at a US airbase in Afghanistan, serving Thanksgiving turkey to the troops, complaining half-jokingly about the length of his surprise trip, and drawing attention to all the money he had spent on the military.

“You’ll come back,” the president told soldiers at the Bagram base – a remark interpreted by the reporters covering the event as a reference to the quality of the food he was giving them, rather than warning of further tours of duty in a war that is already 18 years old.

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Afghanistan’s road to peace still full of obstacles

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Trump claims US-Taliban talks are back on but it is unclear if key disputes have been settled

Donald Trump says talks with the Taliban are back on but it is unclear if the disputes that hobbled the last attempt to reach a peace deal – cancelled by a presidential tweet in September – have been resolved.

The insurgent group responded to Trump by telling Agence France-Presse it was “way too early” to discuss resuming direct talks.

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Donald Trump says Taliban talks back on in surprise Afghanistan visit

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  • President makes Thanksgiving visit to airbase near Kabul
  • Confirms talks with extremists have resumed

Donald Trump made an unannounced visit to US troops in Afghanistan on Thursday, his first visit to the country where the US has been at war since late 2001.

Related: Fired navy secretary blasts Trump over 'shocking' handling of Navy seal case

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Whistleblowers on school paedophile ring in Afghanistan arrested

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Human rights defenders alleged that teachers and social workers were involved in abuse of more than 500 boys

Two people have been detained by Afghanistan’s intelligence services after they exposed a paedophile ring operating in some of the country’s schools.

Human rights organisations and the former president Hamid Karzai have called for the immediate release of Mohammed Mussa and Ehsanullah Hamidi, both well-known human rights defenders from Logar province, who were picked up by the National Directorate of Security last week when they were on their way to meet with the EU ambassador in Kabul.

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British government and army accused of covering up war crimes

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Alleged evidence implicates UK troops in murder of children in Afghanistan and Iraq

The UK government and the British army have been accused of covering up the killing of children in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Leaked documents allegedly contain evidence implicating troops in killing children and the torture of civilians.

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The US and Britain face no existential threat. So why do their wars go on? | Simon Jenkins

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Endless conflicts in the Middle East have cost us dear, yet all we hear are absurdities about ‘keeping our streets safe from terror’

Why does no one mention the war? The most militaristic, belligerent and chauvinist country I know – and also love – is the US. People fly flags from every post and see “bad guys” under every bed. When the president, Donald Trump, vows to leave the Middle East he is condemned as a traitor even by his fans.

The second most belligerent is Britain, albeit less so. With America, it is continuing to fight the so-called “wars of 9/11”, 18 years after they began – battling in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria, in Britain’s case covertly. There is not the remotest sign of “victory” in sight. Somehow they are not seen as wars, just the licensed killing of foreigners.

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What happens to Afghanistan’s left-behind women as the Taliban rises?

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Separated from her family after an attempt to flee failed, Tahira is among a growing number of women left struggling and vulnerable in a country where lone mothers are harshly judged

On a bitterly cold day, Tahira* sits in her rented room in Kabul. She has a husband and three young children, but the last time the family were all together was in 2018 – the day they tried to escape Afghanistan.

Insecurity in their town in Maidan Wardak province led Tahira, 27, to try to flee to Turkey, via Iran, with her family. But when the time came, only her husband, son and seven-year-old daughter made it.

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Afghanistan paedophile ring may be responsible for abuse of over 500 boys

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Social workers claim teachers and local officials are implicated, and believe thousands more children may have been targeted

A paedophile ring involved in the abuse of at least 546 boys from six schools has been discovered in Afghanistan’s Logar province.

Some of the victims of the abuse have since been murdered according to the campaigners who first discovered videos of abuse posted to a Facebook page.

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Taliban prisoners released in bid to free western kidnap victims

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Afghan president Ghani hopes move will help secure release of American and Australian

Afghanistan’s president says he has ordered the release of three Taliban fighters in an effort to persuade the insurgent group to free a kidnapped American and Australian professor.

Timothy Weekes, an English teacher from Wagga Wagga in New South Wales, and Kevin King, from Pennsylvania, were abducted three years ago from outside American University of Afghanistan in Kabul by fighters in military uniform.

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Moving stories: inside the book buses changing children’s lives

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Around the world, mobile library programmes are taking books, educational support and even counselling to communities in serious and urgent need

Every week, two converted blue buses stocked with children’s books carefully navigate the streets of Kabul, avoiding areas where deadly explosions are common. These travelling libraries stop off at schools in different parts of the city, delivering a wealth of reading material directly to youngsters who have limited access to books.

“A lot of schools in our city don’t have access to something as basic as a library,” says Freshta Karim, a 27-year-old Oxford University graduate who was inspired to start Charmaghz, a non-profit, in her home city having grown up without many books herself. “We were trying to understand what we could do to promote critical thinking in our country.”

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Schoolchildren killed by roadside bomb in Afghanistan

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Victims who were aged between 10 and 15 were killed on their way to school official says

Nine children have been killed by a roadside bomb near their school in the north-eastern Takhar province, an Afghan official said.

Sayed Mehraj Sadat, the provincial police chief, said the victims of Saturday’s attack were between 10 and 15 years old. He said the bomb’s intended target was most likely Afghan security forces, who often use the road.

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CIA-linked unit accused of atrocities in Afghanistan

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Document details 14 deadly raids by pro-government units with support of US intelligence

The Afghan soldiers who swept through Kulalgo village one late August night shot three of Dr Ulfatullah’s relatives carefully, a single bullet through their left eye, faces otherwise untouched as blood pooled below their bodies on the floor of the family home.

The last killing was less precise, and left the face of university student Ansarullah badly disfigured. His family thought perhaps he had heard the muffled gunshot that ended a cousin’s life, and briefly tried to struggle against his captors.

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Dressing Afghanistan: young designers get creative in Kabul

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In a deeply conservative society ravaged by years of war, Afghan women still want to be free to wear clothes with style

Photography by Ivan Armando Flores

There’s a steady stream of customers coming through the doors of Rahiba Rahimi’s fashion studio. The 25-year-old’s bold, intricate designs are fitted on mannequins and hung on rails around her showroom in Kabul.

Rahimi is the lead designer and co-proprietor of Laman, a clothing label she helped build in the Afghan capital five years ago.

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Afghanistan mosque bombing: death toll rises

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State blames Taliban for blasts targeting worshippers during Friday prayers

Police and local residents were searching for bodies in the rubble of a mosque in the eastern Nangarhar province of Afghanistan, after bomb blaststhat killed at least 69 people during Friday prayers.

The explosives had been placed inside the mosque in the Jawdara area of Haska Mena district.

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‘They were all killed in front of my eyes’: the brutal cost of war in Afghanistan

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In a country where decades of conflict have taken a profound toll on mental health, professional support is scarce

Human Rights Watch has raised alarms over the lack of mental health support in wartorn Afghanistan, where more than half of the population is experiencing psychological distress.

The advocacy group said that, despite the high prevalence of psychological and mental health conditions, the Afghan government is failing to provide adequate help, with fewer than 10% of the country’s population receiving assistance.

HRW cited a 2018 EU survey that said the overwhelming majority of the country’s population (85%) have seen or been involved in at least one traumatic event in their lives.

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Prosecutors say ex-Taliban hostage intentionally tried to mislead court

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Prosecutors say Joshua Boyle, Canadian man on trial for assaulting his wife, advanced a narrative that’s ‘incompatible with reality’

The testimony of Joshua Boyle, the former Afghanistan hostage on trial for assaulting his wife, was intentionally crafted to mislead the court, prosecutors have argued in closing arguments.

Crown lawyers once again took aim at Joshua Boyle’s credibility on Wednesday, suggesting he had manipulated his testimony for self-serving ends.

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Safe space: the new cinema welcoming women in male-dominated Kabul

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Cinema once thrived in Afghanistan until Taliban censorship. Now, new ventures are slowly reviving it

The majority of Kabul’s cinemas cater largely to audiences of young men, and tend to show Bollywood films produced in Pakistan and India. For some young Afghan men, the cinema is a rare occasion for public expressions of joy: audience members cheer on the films’ heroes and sometimes dance along.

For most women, however, fears of harassment in a male-dominated space have made cinemas feel unwelcoming.

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Afghanistan polls close after day of violence, fraud claims and chaos

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Bomb wounds 15, despite 70,000 police and troops at polling stations, and turnout set to be low

Afghanistan’s presidential polls have closed amid accusations of fraud and misconduct. Insurgent attacks aimed at disrupting voting in the country’s north and south caused dozens of casualties.

An upsurge in violence in the run-up to the elections, following the collapse of US-Taliban talks to end America’s longest war, had already rattled Afghanistan in the past weeks. Yet many voters yesterday expressed equal frustration over relentless government corruption and widespread chaos at polling stations.

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‘Voting means you’re crazy’: violence and fraud overshadow Afghanistan poll

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Incumbent president says election is vital to give government a democratic mandate in talks with Taliban

Afghanistan must choose a new president this week, but every election over the last decade has been riddled with fraud and marred by violence, and fears are growing that the poll on may be the worst yet.

It comes as the war is raging with unprecedented intensity. Last week alone, dozens were killed when the Taliban flattened a hospital in an attack in the south, and a US drone strike hit a group harvesting pine nuts in the east. And looming over the poll is the future of controversial US efforts to negotiate a troop withdrawal with the Taliban, suspended after a tweet by President Donald Trump but not entirely dead.

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Afghanistan: dozens dead as country is rocked by triple attacks – video report

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At least nine people have been wounded in eastern Afghanistan by a suicide bomber and gunmen in an attack on Wednesday, that came 24 hours after two other attacks in the country left more than 48 people dead.  

The Taliban have claimed responsibility for Tuesday’s attacks, while no one has yet said they were behind Wednesday’s attack. 

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