Afghanistan Analysts Network – English

Month: May 2014

The five Taliban swapped for Bowe Bergdahl

AAN •

CBS, 31 May 2014 As a background to the deal that freed US soldier Bowe Bergdahl from Taleban captivity, the TV station uses AAN material on the five Taleban leaders that were meant to be swapped in 2012. The five Taleban leaders now swapped have not officially been named yet.

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Nicht alle Afghanen freuen sich über US-Truppenabzug

AAN •

SRF (Swiss radio), 30 May 2014 Summary of an interview (with complete audio file of it), commenting on Obama’s announcement on the (still imcomplete) US troop drawdown till 2016.

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Thousands of private contractors will remain in Afghanistan

AAN •

Digital Journal, 30 May 2014 Self-explanatory article with some intersting catch words: The Overseas Contingency Operations budget, Counter-Terrorism Partnership Fund, US private intelligence and military contractors, Expeditionary Warfare; Irregular Warfare; Special Operations; Stabilization and Reconstruction Operations.

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The Other Transfer of Power: Fahim’s death and Massud’s succession

Fabrizio Foschini •

Until the elections of 5 April, the demise of Marshal Mohammed Qasim Fahim constituted the single major political event of 2014 in Afghanistan. His death directly affects the internal politics of a large group of Afghans: all those living in the north-eastern quadrant of the country. Tracing the political ascent of Fahim and assessing the […]

Political Landscape Read more

Political horse trading grips Afghanistan before election run-off

AAN •

Reuters, 29 May 2014 “It’s a part of Afghan politics unfortunately, the current deal-making,” said Afghanistan Analyst Network researcher, Qayoom Suroush. “You don’t need to go to every each voter to convince them vote for you – you need to go to the elders, the tribal leaders and community leaders, and convince them to convince […]

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Flaws in the governance

Thomas Ruttig •

The Gulf Today/The Independent, 28 May 2014 The author in the Independent writes: “money spent on Afghanistan does not mean money spent in Afghanistan, but even taking this into account it is extraordinary that, despite gargantuan sums spent, Afghan government figures reveal that 60 per cent of children are malnourished and only 27 per cent […]

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From Kabul to Calais

AAN •

BBC, 28 May 2014 About 200 Afghans are among almost 1,000 migrants living in squalid conditions in the French port city of Calais, just across the English Channel from Britain. Among them was the man who grabbed the headlines this month when he set sail on an improvised raft to try and get to the UK, […]

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A Second ‘Death List’: More on those forcibly disappeared in the civil war

P. Gossman •

After last year’s release of a ‘death list’ containing almost 5000 names of men who ‘disappeared’ in the late 1970s, another list is to be publicly available soon, this time listing 671 men who were forcibly disappeared during the civil war in Kabul in the mid-1990s. The document was put together, at the time, by […]

Rights and Freedoms Read more

Death of a Sahebzada: A story of different strands of thought in the Taleban movement

Bette Dam •

Earlier this year, a radical Afghan religious leader from a family of Sufi Pirs was murdered in Quetta, Pakistan. His name was Abdullah Zakeri Sahebzada. His relationships with the Taleban’s leadership and repeated calls for international jihad had earned him the ‘Taleb’ label in some media. But Zakeri, once a mediator in the Taleban movement, had […]

Context and Culture Read more

Work on Afghanistan’s sole rail line falls to five soldiers

AAN •

Stars and Stripes, 24 May 2014 An intersting rendering on Afghanistan’s only railway line and the US soldiers who work on its terminus, at Hairaton. (The Afghans who must be working there are not mentioned, for some reasons.)

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Zwölf Jahre Afghanistaneinsatz: eine Zwischenbilanz

Thomas Ruttig •

Bundeswehr-Journal, 24 May 2014 The German military forces’ website summarises the statement by AAN’s Thomas Ruttig at a hearing at the foreign affairs committee of the German parliament trying to draw lessons from 13 years of ISAF, initiated by the Green faction: […] Doch zunächst zu Thomas Ruttig, Mitbegründer und Co-Direktor der unabhängigen, gemeinnützigen Forschungsinstitution „Afghanistan […]

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Pour WikiLeaks, la NSA sait tout des conversations téléphoniques en Afghanistan

Thomas Ruttig •

France24, 23 May 2014 Asked whether he is surprised about Wikileaks’ disclosure that Afghanistan is onw of the two countries where all phone calls have been recorded by the NSA, AAN’s Thomas Ruttig is not surprised and says that everyone in Afghanistan has been conviced of that for a long time and that mobile phones are […]

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