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Responses to the President’s Ruling; Will the Opposition Hold?

The parliamentary stand-off is apparently nearing its end. Manawi, the head of the Independent Electoral Commission, is expected to announce a decision towards the end of the week – a responsibility that has been passed on from the Special Electoral Tribunal to the Kabul Appeals Court, back to the President, and now finally to the […]

15 Aug 2011 Martine van Bijlert • Political Landscape

How to Read the Presidential Ruling

On Wednesday morning, 10 August 2011, the Palace issued presidential ruling no. 3607 “Regarding the settlement of the 1389 electoral dispute”. It is a remarkably complicated and opaque legal text, which has led to a wide variety of conflicting interpretations. The confusing language and the silence on the side of the palace on what it […]

11 Aug 2011 Martine van Bijlert • Political Landscape

Conflict going East, conflict going on

The US-led Coalition has declared that its troops’ new strategic focus will be on eastern Afghanistan, after its claims of gains made in southern Afghanistan last year. Although the bad security situation in the East is not new, the recent emphasis on it may be mainly linked to the increased interest (and concern) of the […]

10 Aug 2011 Fabrizio Foschini • War and Peace

Political Insecurity and Reports of Worrying Developments

Afghan politics are fast-paced and slow at the same time; often more smoke than fire, but unpredictable enough to keep everyone on their toes and to keep the political class engaged in endless cycles of meetings. The chatter is a steady hum on the background of whatever is going on in the country. In insecure […]

9 Aug 2011 Martine van Bijlert • Political Landscape

Uruzgan’s New Chief of Police: Matiullah’s Dream Come True

Since the complex attack on Uruzgan on 28 July 2011, people in Tirin Kot have been jumpy. So last night, 7 August 2011, when around 9 pm shooting was heard throughout the city people feared the worst. It turned out to have been traditional congratulatory shooting in the air, saluting the appointing of Matiullah Khan […]

8 Aug 2011 Susanne Schmeidl • Political Landscape

Ten Killed in Badakhshan: One year on

A year ago today, in one of the worst attacks on humanitarian workers of the war, ten medical workers and their support staff were murdered in Badakhshan. They had just trekked across 5000m passes to one of the remotest areas of the country: the Parun valley of Nuristan to give out free eye care, dental […]

5 Aug 2011 Kate Clark • War and Peace

Guest blog: Being a journalist in Uruzgan

Martin Gerner, a freelance correspondent in Afghanistan for German radio and national print media, has been training and mentoring Afghan journalists since 2004. One such training course took place only few weeks ago with a group of journalists from Tirinkot. The then BBC/Pajhwok stringer, Ahmad Omaid Khpalwak, had actively helped to bring the training group […]

5 Aug 2011 Martin Gerner • War and Peace

Killings keep leaders at home

The goal of the attack on Tirinkot on 31 July, said the Taleban spokesman, Qari Yusuf Ahmadi, was ‘to make the government collapse.’ Those actually killed by the Taleban were not ‘the government’ but mainly civilians, including three women and the BBC/Pajhwok journalist, Ahmed Omaid Khpalwak. But the attack could easily have resulted in the […]

4 Aug 2011 Kate Clark • War and Peace

ALP programme might create a rude Afghan awakening

Is the new Afghan Local Police one of the new silver bullets for successful transition or just a new militia? General Petraeus who designed the programme (after a similar one in Iraq) claims the first while some media already see abuses, as signs for the latter. But until recently, reports about such ‘ALP abuses’ were […]

2 Aug 2011 Thomas Ruttig • War and Peace

Talibanrörelsens uppkomst och drivkrafter: en bakgrund inför Bonn II-konferensen om Afghanistan i december 2011

Ann Wilkens, FOI (Stockholm), background paper FOI-R–3243–SE, August 2011 (in Swedish) From the summary: The aim to this study is to give an in depth description of those destructive forces, inside and outside of Afghanistan, that oppose the international intervention and contend its goals. Over the last few years, the Afghan Taliban have expanded their […]

1 Aug 2011 Ann Wilkens • External publications

Death of an Uruzgan Journalist

Last Thursday, 28 July, the capital of the southern province of Uruzgan saw the most devastating Taleban attack so far this year. Although it did not achieve its declared aim, to kill local strongmen Matiullah, and the far less influential governor Omar Sherzad and his deputy Khodai Rahim, a lot of civilians were killed. Susanne […]

31 Jul 2011 Susanne Schmeidl • War and Peace

Malalai’s wayward sisters

Being a woman criminal in Afghanistan may not lead to wide public recognition as it does in neighbouring India, but Afghan ladies actually have a very respectable tradition of being ‘bandit queens’. In the event of a newly reported instance of this type, AAN’s archival team looks at a couple of memorable past characters. A […]

31 Jul 2011 AAN • Context and Culture

Guest Blog: Why a Breakthrough is Unlikely at Bonn 2

On 5 December, on the tenth anniversary of the Bonn Agreement, Germany will host the Bonn II conference. There are exaggerated views in the Afghan public about what the conference is trying to achieve, that – with the ‘talks about talks’ continuing – it might even embark on setting up a new composition of power […]

30 Jul 2011 Abbas Daiyar • International Engagement

Women and Reconciliation: What are the Concerns?

Peace is not made with friends, it is made with enemies. Peace deals are then about finding a minimum common ground and making compromises: It comes at a cost, but the price is not necessarily equal for everybody. Sari Kouvo, AAN Senior Analyst, discusses some of the key themes that came up in her meetings […]

28 Jul 2011 Sari Kouvo • War and Peace

Civilian Casualties 2: Taleban claims to protect civilians laid bare

Accusations against the Taleban are becoming more pointed: their indiscriminate use of IEDs is a war crime, said UNAMA in its most recent mid-year report on civilian casualties, as well as violating a ban on land-mines made by Mulla Omar in 1998. The Taleban continues to insist its hands are clean, but, as AAN Senior […]

27 Jul 2011 Kate Clark • War and Peace

Reading newspapers on an airplane (2)

After another longer stay in Kabul, reading newspapers on an airplane brings one back into the news mainstream – because, while in Afghanistan, you simply are overwhelmed by events there and develop some kind of tunnel vision. This time, it was particularly dreadful: with the series of political assassinations, both in northern and southern Afghanistan, […]

26 Jul 2011 Thomas Ruttig • War and Peace

Parliament Odyssey: A special appeal court to replace the Special Court?

The Wolesi Jirga should have gone into its summer recess and, by now, come back again. But it delayed the recess, so that MPs could stand against the decision on 26 June by the Special Court to exclude 62 MPs whose legitimacy it questioned. Two of the 62 have appealed to the Special Court’s appeal […]

25 Jul 2011 Gran Hewad • Political Landscape

The Enteqal Seven (6): What is left to transition in Kabul

Against the blazing red background of increasingly brazen attacks carried out inside the capital, Kabul province moves towards the imminent transition of security. How this is going to affect the situation in the province, as the city and most of the districts have already been transitioned de facto in 2008-09, is not clear. However, it […]

21 Jul 2011 Fabrizio Foschini • War and Peace

Civilian Casualties 1: Progress in the war or a ‘perpetually escalating stalemate’?

General Petraeus has handed over command of ISAF and US forces in Afghanistan, with talk of progress – albeit fragile and with ‘tough times’ ahead. His confidence was belied by reports or statements on the human cost of the war from three respected international institutions working in Afghanistan over the past week: ICRC said, ‘insecurity […]

21 Jul 2011 Kate Clark • War and Peace

Better late than never: 14 more ex-Taleban delisted

The UNSC sanctions committee has taken 14 more former Taleban off the black list. Among them are three dead men, four Higher Peace Council (HPC) members, seven former deputy ministers and a former ambassador (categories overlap), the president of the Taleban Academy of Sciences and four low-ranking, former Taleban diplomats. AAN’s Senior Analyst Thomas Ruttig […]

20 Jul 2011 Thomas Ruttig • Political Landscape