Month: March 2026

Breaking Point? The mounting conflict between Afghanistan and Pakistan 

Fabrizio Foschini • Rachel Reid • Roxanna Shapour •

Over the past six months, the conflict between Afghanistan and Pakistan has extended from low-level border skirmishes to talk of “open war.” Pakistan conducted its first-ever air strikes in Kabul in October 2025, targeting Tehrik-e Taliban-e Pakistan (TTP) and, more recently, on 16 March 2026, bombed the city, killing more than 140 civilians. Islamabad, for the […]

29 Mar 2026

Radio Emerges as Alternative Learning Tool for Afghan Girls, Afghanistan Analysts Network

Kabul Tribune, 24 March 2026 In this news item, the Australia-based online media summarises the main findings ans conclusions of AAN’s latest research, about radio-based education becoming a key alternative for Afghan girls who lost access to formal schooling following restrictions imposed in 2021.

24 Mar 2026

Taliban-Strafrecht in Afghanistan: Die Vier-Klassen-Gesellschaft

Qantara, 23 March 2026 This article on the German Middle East focussed website by Jan Ritter analyses the new Taleban penal code, quoting from Kate Clark’s AAN analysis of the document and quoting AAN’s Thomas Ruttig. It emphasises that [a]ccording to an analysis by Kate Clark of the Afghanistan Analysts Network (AAN), the new penal […]

23 Mar 2026

Bridging the Divide? Radio learning and girls’ education in rural Afghanistan

Sharif Akram •

When classrooms fell silent for older Afghan girls in 2021, millions were cut off from formal schooling, deepening long-standing inequalities between girls and boys. Yet learning did not stop – it adapted. Across the country, alternative avenues have emerged to try to help fill the gap. Among them, radio-based education has taken on particular significance, […]

22 Mar 2026

Obituary for Sultan Ali Keshtmand (1935-2026): Afghanistan’s Soviet-era political leader and Hazara rights advocate

Thomas Ruttig •

Few Afghan politicians from the era of the Soviet-backed People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA) regime combined technocratic skill with a clear focus on combatting ethnic inequality, as Sultan Ali Keshtmand did. Born into a modest Hazara family, he rose to the top echelons of the party, navigating imprisonment, internal PDPA purges and shifting Soviet […]

21 Mar 2026

The fight to control the narrative in the Afghan-Pakistan conflict

BBC, 20 March 2026 Despite media and UN reports that a drug rehabilitation facility had been impacted, Pakistan’s military has not acknowledged civilian casualties. Instead, its military spokesman levied more accusations.“The truth is they round up drug addicts and use them as suicide bombers,” Lt Gen Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry, Pakistan’s military’s spokesman, said in an […]

20 Mar 2026

Pakistanischer Angriff auf Kabul: Wie Verbündete zu Feinden wurden

Spiegel, 19 March 2026 The leading German news magazine interviews AAN’s Thomas Ruttig about the recent Pakistani airstrike on a Kabul drug rehabilitation clinic, while Pakistan insists that it hit a military target. He says that news reports from the attack site suggest that this is an attempt to cover up what might amount to […]

19 Mar 2026

Afghans Search for Missing Family Members After Strike on Rehab Center Kills At Least 400

Drop Site News, 19 March 2026 Important on-the-ground reporting on Pakistan’s air strike against a Kabul drub rehab centre.

19 Mar 2026

Krieg am Hindukusch: Zivilisten in der Eskalationsspirale

Tageszeitung, 17 March 2026 For the Berlin-based daily newspaper, AAN’s Thomas Ruttig reports the results of the Pakistani airstrike that hit a drug rehabilitation centre in Kabul and provides background on the centre itself and the war of words around the strike.

17 Mar 2026

US pressure on the UN: UNAMA gets only a three-month mandate renewal

Jelena Bjelica •

The mandate of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) is due to be renewed by the UN Security Council on Monday, 16 March. Although the penholder on Afghanistan, China, had not initially suggested any changes to the mandate, following urging by the United States, the mandate will be extended only for three months, […]

15 Mar 2026

روایت‌های ناگفته‌ چهار شاهد عینی ۲۵ سال بعد از تخریب بودا  [The untold stories of four eyewitnesses 25 years after the destruction of the Buddha]

BBC Dari, 11 March 2026 AAN’s Kate Clark is one quoted in the report: Kate Clark, a British journalist who was a BBC correspondent in Kabul from 1999 to 2002 and is currently one of the directors of the Afghanistan Analysts Network, tells her story of that period as follows: “I was lucky enough to […]

11 Mar 2026

Taking Stock of the Proposal to Codify Gender Apartheid in the Crimes against Humanity Convention

Opinio Juris, 10 March 2026 In this commentary with the self-explanatory title, the authors quote a recent AAN report: As the Afghanistan Analysts Network explains, “[t]hroughout the Code, it addresses men. Women are almost invisible unless the regulation concerns what is done to them. In that case, they might be looked at, asked after, beaten, cursed, […]

10 Mar 2026