Month: June 2022

Powered by Twitter? The Taliban’s Takeover of Afghanistan

Centre for Artificial Intelligence, Data, and Conflict at Princeton University, June 2022 A new report based on the study of “the activity of 63 accounts claimed by the Taliban leadership, spokespersons, and avowed members from April 1 to September 16, 2021” with more than two million followers in September 2021, and of “the broader Taliban […]

30 Jun 2022

Nadelstiche gegen Taliban: Opposition in Afghanistan

Tageszeitung, 27 June 2022 AAN’s Thomas Ruttig gives a brief overview of the new anti-Taleban resistance groups inside and outside the country, concluding that they face a “lack of broader mobilisation” due to the facts that many in Afghanistan identify their leaders with the previous governments systemic corruption”, “war crimes” of the past and, mainly, […]

27 Jun 2022

Free at Last: The Afghan, Harun Gul, is released from Guantanamo after 15 years

Kate Clark •

One of the last two remaining Afghans held in Guantanamo Bay, Asadullah Harun Gul, has been released after his lawyers threatened the United States government with contempt of court. A judge had ruled in November 2021 that the government was holding him unlawfully and must release him. A month earlier, a review board at Guantanamo […]

25 Jun 2022

Vorletzter afghanischer Häftling entlassen

dpa/ARD-Tagesschau, 24 June 2022 The website of Germany’s main public news reel, via dpa, quotes from AAN research on the penultimate Afghan detainee in Guantanamo, just released.

24 Jun 2022

Erdbeben in Afghanistan: Den Opfern beistehen

Tageszeitung, 24 June 2022 Op-ed commentary (in German) by AAN’s Thomas Ruttig in the Berlin-based daily, arguing that “donor governments, despite their well-founded rejection of the Taleban regime, should now mobilise all assistance that is needed.”

24 Jun 2022

Erdbeben in Afghanistan: “Es ist sehr schwer, die Hilfe dort hinzubekommen”

Die Zeit, 22 June 2022 Q&A in the German weekly’s online version about the devastating earthquake in Afghanistan, with many quotes from AAN’s Thomas Ruttig (in German).

22 Jun 2022

Das nächste Desaster: Naturkatastrophe in Afghanistan

Tageszeitung, 22 June 2022 AAN’s Thomas Ruttig writes in the Berlin-based daily about the heavy earthquake this morning in Afghanistan’s southeast, the Taleban and international response, with a short aside on UN-Taleban relations after two ministers did not get their travel exemption renewed by the Security Council, apparently an answer to the misogynist policies of […]

22 Jun 2022

Nur leere Versprechen

NZZ-Magazin, 18 June 2022 In this lengthy piece about Taleban education policies (in German, behind pay wall), AAN’s Thomas Ruttig is quoted.

18 Jun 2022

We’re convicted of being women, says newsreader ordered by Taliban to cover face

Daily Telegraph, 15 June 2022 This article in the daily quotes from recent AAN research about how Afghan women deal with and think about the Taleban’s ‘burqa decree’: Recent research by the Afghanistan Analysts Network found widespread variation across the country in how women were adapting to the new rule and whether local Taliban officials […]

15 Jun 2022

Policing Public Morality: Debates on promoting virtue and preventing vice in the Taleban’s second Emirate

Sabawoon Samim •

The Taleban’s ‘religious police’ are back in force, leaving many Afghans fearing a return to the notorious brutalities of the Taleban’s 1990s Amr bil-Maruf ministry. Yet, two decades on, argues guest author Sabawoon Samim* (with input from Roxanna Shapour), Taleban views on the promotion of virtue and prevention of vice have evolved, as has Afghan […]

15 Jun 2022

«They Have Their Rulers in Kabul, We Rule Ourselves Here»: An Example of Local Self-Governance in Taliban-Controlled Afghanistan

SIGA, 14 June 2022 A very insightful report from Nuristan by Swiss Franz Marty for the Swiss Institute for Global Affairs, reflecting the still existing diversity even in Taleban-dominated Afghanistan. It shows that even some pre-Islamic institutions of self rule seem to have survived in parts of the province, of course now in ‘Islamic’ disguise.

14 Jun 2022

Viele Ortskräfte sollten ausgeflogen werden – Familie Jabari hat es geschafft

RTL, 8 June 2022 A quote from AAN’s Thomas Ruttig in this clip (starting at 2:44min) on the private RTL TV network (video and transcript, in German): Thomas Ruttig vom Afghanistan Analyst Network ist überzeugt, dass es auf lange Sicht nur die Menschen in Afghanistan selbst schaffen, die Taliban zu verdrängen. Doch das könnte noch […]

8 Jun 2022