Afghanistan: IS-Dschihadisten fordern Taliban heraus

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Deutsche Welle, 17 February 2025

Before the backdrop of the two latest IS-claimed suicide attacks in Kunduz and Kabul, this article on the website of Germany’s international broadcaster looks at the activity of ISKP and it potential as a threat to the Taleban regime. Among others, AAN’s Thomas Ruttig is quoted here (original in German):

The jihadist group Islamic State (IS) claimed responsibility for both attacks. However, the letters of confession did not come from the Afghan branch of IS, the so-called Islamic State Province of Khorasan (ISPK), but from the leadership of IS as a whole, says Thomas Ruttig, co-founder of the independent think tank ‘Afghanistan Analysts Network’, in an interview with DW.

According to Ruttig, there are plausible motives for this: ‘After IS was driven out of Syria and Iraq and went on the defensive, the centre now wants to present itself again as an active player that acts through its regional arm, but decides on the type of actions itself.’

(…)

Answering a question about the Taleban accusation that the attack origined beyond its own borders:

This belongs in the context of the recriminations that Afghanistan and Pakistan are levelling at each other, says Thomas Ruttig. ‘Pakistan accuses Afghanistan of not doing enough against the Pakistani Taleban, some of whom operate from the Afghan side in the border area between the two countries. Kabul, on the other hand, says that ISKP maintains at least one training camp in the Pakistani province of Balochistan and launches attacks in Afghanistan from there. There is some truth in both claims. However, it is not yet possible to say whether one or both of the current attacks originated from there.’ However, the ISKP is often recruiting Pakistani [former TTP] fighters as well as former members of Central Asian jihadist groups.”

(…)

On Taleban-ISKP relations he is quoted as saying:

‘The Taliban are cracking down violently on IS,’ says Thomas Ruttig. ‘They are very active in this regard. There are repeated arrests and military operations in which alleged or actual IS fighters and sympathisers are killed or arrested.’ But this is still insufficient to dispel the insecurity felt by the population in the face of these attacks, says Ruttig. ‘But it must also be said that these attacks are not capable of seriously shaking the Taliban regime.’