Afghanistan Analysts Network – English

Thomas Ruttig

The Big Maybe: First presidential candidates position themselves

Thomas Ruttig •

Less than a month before the registration of candidates for the 2014 presidential election opens on 16 September this year, a number of prominent Afghan politicians have positioned themselves as potential candidates. Others are just now making their presence known in public appearances. Several political party councils and opposition alliances still struggle to find a […]

Political Landscape Read more

Opaque and Dilemma-Ridden: A look back at transition

Thomas Ruttig •

At its Lisbon summit in November 2010 NATO made “transition” its official strategy for Afghanistan, setting mid-2013 as the time when responsibility for security throughout all of Afghanistan should have been handed over – or “transitioned” – from NATO to the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) in a process of five phases. This time has […]

War and Peace Read more

“I, Mulla Omar”: Two takes on the Taleban leader’s Eid message

Thomas Ruttig •

It has become a regular exercise by now: Taleban leader Mulla Muhammad Omar addressing “our pious people” on the occasion of religious and national holidays. As this year’s Eid al Fitr message again plays some conciliatory strings – except towards the government in Kabul and its foreign military allies – many have argued that deeds […]

War and Peace Read more

Neue Gewalt in Pakistan

Thomas Ruttig •

Deutschlandradio Kultur, 9 August 2013 Listen to an audio of an interview with AAN’s Thomas Ruttig (in German) about the latest wave of violence in Pakistan, looking at the different strands of conflict – the Afghanistan-related one (and the different positions of the Afghan and Pakistani Taleban), the separatist movement in Balochistan and the sectarian […]

AAN in the Media Read more

NSA und Afghanistan: Die tödlichen Folgen der Datensammelei (print only)

Thomas Ruttig •

Wochenzeitung (Zurich), 8 August 2013 When the government in Berlin had to answer questions about its cooperation with the US in the data collection operations of the NSA, its intelligence service, the BND, revealed that two listening installations in Bavaria are linked to “telecommunications intelligence gathering in Afghanistan”. When AAN’s Kate Clark reported in 2011about […]

AAN in the Media Read more

Bilateral [Afghan-Iranian] Relations: A blossoming friendship?

Thomas Ruttig •

Deutsche Welle (online), 8 August 2013 AAN’s Thomas Ruttig is one of the experts commenting on the recent signing of an Afghan-Iranian MoU mainly about military and security cooperation. He says that it was a “clear message to the US that Afghanistan has other options” of security cooperation; in the light of the withdrawal of […]

AAN in the Media Read more

Can Kabul Carry Two Melons in One Hand? Afghanistan and Iran sign strategic cooperation document

Thomas Ruttig •

Almost unnoticed by the international media, Afghanistan and Iran have signed a “Strategic Cooperation Agreement” during President Karzai’s recent trip to Tehran. The document includes provisions on bilateral military, intelligence and economic cooperation. The sequence indicates importance; the agreement is mainly a security agreement. However, it also contains ideas for a number of trilateral extensions […]

Regional Relations Read more

Omar aus dem Off

Thomas Ruttig •

Frankfurter Allgemeine (online), 6 August 2013 Analysing Taleban leader Mulla Muhammad Omar’s Eid festival message, Friederike Böge quotes AAN’s Thomas Ruttig as saying that the conspicuously repeated use of “I” in the message is to signal that doubts about him being alive and in control are a mistake (although the message doesn’t prove this). He […]

AAN in the Media Read more

Ruttig: “Afghanistan-Abzug kommt zu früh und zu spät”

Thomas Ruttig •

Deutsche Welle (online), 6 August 2013 In an interview on the latest demand of the German Bundeswehr Association to keep German combat troops in Afghanistan after 2014, AAN’s Thomas Ruttig comments in an interview that this, first, has to be decided by the Afghans and, second, would not make sense as long as there is […]

AAN in the Media Read more

Nicht ganz unabhängige Kommission: Afghanistan bereitet Wahlen vor

Thomas Ruttig •

Tageszeitung, 31 July 2013 In this article for the Berlin daily (in German), AAN’s Thomas Ruttig analyses the appointment of the nine new members of Afghanistan’s Independent Election Commission, saying that it has ‘a professional varnish’ but that, finally, “the interests of networks close to ‘the Palace’ have gained the upper hand’ in its ranks. […]

AAN in the Media Read more

Mali, Afghanistan – Conflicts Worlds Apart? Parallels and Lessons to be Learnt

Thomas Ruttig •

When jihadist groups took over the northern half of Mali last year and French troops intervened in January this year, a discussion ensued in the media and among analysts about whether Mali was, or would become, a ‘second’ or ‘African’ Afghanistan. Most found a comparison ludicrous. With Mali’s presidential election coming up on today, 28 […]

International Engagement Read more

Afghanistan Analysts Network: US holds inmates in Bagram’s secret jail

AAN •

FreeDetainees.org, 26 July 2013 The website quotes from an AAN dispatch about the US-run Black Jail at Bagram: The Afghanistan Analysts Network says it has found that the U.S. is running a secret jail at Bagram Airbase in which Afghan inmates are being tortured. In March 2013, the U.S. military said it handed over the […]

AAN in the Media Read more

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