Afghanistan

Western nations, led by the United States, on Saturday blasted the Taliban over “summary killings” and forced disappearances of former members of the Afghan security forces reported by rights groups.

This comes a week after Human Rights Watch released a 25-page report documenting the killing or disappearance of former military personnel, police, intelligence service members, and militia.

“We are deeply concerned by reports of summary killings and enforced disappearances of former members of the Afghan security forces as documented by Human Rights Watch and others,” read a joint statement by 22 nations, including the US, France, Germany, and Japan.

That’ll strike fear in their hearts!

More than 100 former Afghan security forces have been killed by the Taliban or have disappeared since the militants seized control, according to a new report by Human Rights Watch.

The rights group said an amnesty promised by Taliban’s leadership had not prevented local commanders from targeting former soldiers and police.

HRW accused the leadership of “condoning” the “deliberate” killings.

A Taliban spokesman recently denied any revenge killings were taking place.

What a God-Awful scam that all was.

Women have been banned from appearing in television dramas in Afghanistan under new rules imposed by the Taliban government.

Female journalists and presenters have also been ordered to wear headscarves on screen, although the guidelines do not say which type of covering to use.

Reporters say some of the rules are vague and subject to interpretation.

The Taliban seized power in Afghanistan in mid-August and many fear they are gradually imposing harsh restrictions.

Despite talk of a Taliban ban, in Helmand’s poppy fields farmers and traders say they are not the only ones who depend on the drug to survive

The Taliban’s announcement that it plans to ban the production of opium in Afghanistan does not faze seasoned dealer Ahmed Khan*.

“They could not fund their war if there were no opium,” says Khan, who operates out of Baramcha, close to the border with Pakistan.

He has traded in the drug for a quarter of a century and is confident that the group cannot really afford for trade to stop.

“There would be a backlash from the poppy farmers, drug lords and the public if the Taliban bans the opium production. The Taliban has benefited the most from opium production over 20 years.”

Afghanistan’s former finance minister has claimed that “ghost soldiers” and corrupt government officials were responsible for the Taliban’s ability to quickly seize control of the country, as NATO forces withdrew their personnel.

Speaking on Wednesday, Khalid Payenda, who served as the Afghan finance minister immediately before the Taliban’s takeover, claimed that around 300,000 soldiers and police officers listed on the government’s payroll did not exist.

The so-called “ghost soldiers” were kept on the books by corrupt officials who pocketed their wages, according to Payenda, who said they were “desertions [and] martyrs who were never accounted for” by commanders who “would keep their bank cards.”

Good Lord. Now we know why the State Department keeps playing coy with the number of legal permanent American residents (LPRs) Joe Biden left to the Taliban. While the White House and Foggy Bottom talked about a couple of hundred American citizens, they knew that the total number of Americans ranged as high as fourteen thousand, according to Foreign Policy and testimony in Congress…

The State Department sought to redact “wholesale” public reports by the U.S. inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction during the Biden administration’s chaotic withdrawal from Kabul, the watchdog said Friday.

Special Inspector General John Sopko said the State Department requested on Aug. 19 that his office remove 2,400 items from publicly available reports “based on unspecified privacy concerns.” The list included such information as the name of former Afghan President Ashraf Ghani and a reference in one report to Chattanooga, Tennessee.

Mr. Sopko called the requests baffling but said his office nevertheless undertook a detailed review of the material that the administration wanted to be removed. He said all but four minor requests were found to be “baseless.”