Afghanistan Analysts Network – English

Thomas Ruttig

The Qatar Office Conundrum: Karzai’s quest for control over Taleban talks

Thomas Ruttig •

During President Karzai’s recent visit to Qatar, discussions about a possible Taleban office were high on the agenda, and the visit had been charged with expectations in advance. Surprisingly, not much has been officially publicised about its outcome after the president returned home. AAN’s Senior Analyst Thomas Ruttig tries to make sense of the trip […]

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New Trouble in the Jombesh: Dostum reasserts leadership

Thomas Ruttig •

The official leader of Jombesh party has been relieved of his post, along with eight other members of the party’s political committee. The sacked chairman, Sayed Nurullah Sadat, has cried foul, saying he could only be removed by a party congress and accusing the party’s founder, General Dostum, of being behind his dismissal. This looks […]

Political Landscape Read more

Ustad Atta for President? The ‘Northern Front’ Summit and other Pre-Election Manoeuvres

Thomas Ruttig •

Seven months before candidate registration starts this year for the 2014 presidential election(1) and 15 months before the incumbent has to leave his position for good, positioning for the post-Hamed Karzai period has picked up. Five leaders of non-Pashtun factions or movements, mainly former mujahedin, have decided to look for a joint candidate who might […]

Political Landscape Read more

How It All Began: Pre-1979 Origins of Afghanistan’s Conflict

Thomas Ruttig •

For most people, it was the Soviet invasion over Christmas 1979 that put Afghanistan on the political map when, in the very last days of the 1970s, the Soviet leadership made the central Asian country the arena of the hottest conflict in the last part of the Cold War. As a result, the internationalised Afghanistan […]

Special Reports Read more

Where Many Streets Have No Name: One for the Freedom of Speech?

Thomas Ruttig •

Afghan journalists want to rename a street in central Kabul ‘Freedom of Speech Street’ to honour the many colleagues who have sacrificed their lives in this cause over the past ten years. Their initiative has met some resistance – not because of the content but because the street already bears the name of an independence […]

Rights and Freedoms Read more

Qatar, Islamabad, Chantilly, Ashgabad: Taleban Talks Season Again? (amended)

Thomas Ruttig •

There has again been movement in the positions marking the landscape of ‘reconciliation’ or, more precisely, of contacts and possible negotiations with the Taleban seem to be moving again. A track II meeting, labelled as ‘intra-Afghan’ talks, was held in France and, before that, the so-called ‘HPC roadmap’ leaked, indicating a more active role of […]

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Cómo empezó todo: Un breve repaso a los orígenes de los conflictos en Afganistán anteriores a 1979 (How It All Began: An Introduction into the pre-1979 origins of Afghanistan’s Conflicts)

Thomas Ruttig •

Papeles de relaciones ecosociales y cambio global. (Número 119), Madrid For most people, it was the Soviet invasion over Christmas 1979 that put Afghanistan on the political map again after many decades. But the origins of the internationalised Afghanistan conflict, currently in its 33rd year and often explained through a Cold War perspective only, goes […]

External publications Read more

The Refugees and the Christmas Tree: Afghan Asylum Seekers Protest in Berlin

Thomas Ruttig •

German asylum law has been under fire from human rights campaigners for years, for what its critics call the unfair limitations imposed on refugees. Only in July this year, the German Constitutional Court threw out the German government’s current provisions for social services for refugees as ‘evidently insufficient’ and unconstitutional because they are under the […]

Migration Read more

Protecting Freedom at the Hindukush: Source of Famous Afghanistan Quote Dies

Thomas Ruttig •

On Wednesday, former German defence minister Peter Struck died, he who coined the controversial sentence that Germany’s security needs to be defended even ‘at the Hindukush’. Almost no other statement has shaped the Afghanistan-related discussion in Germany like this one. AAN’s Thomas Ruttig looks back at this debate and finds it being more of a […]

International Engagement Read more

After the Executions: What approach to the death penalty?

Thomas Ruttig •

After the execution of 14 prisoners last week, Afghan civil society has rightly ridiculed the Taleban who demanded an end to executions. But it has not taken up the question of the death penalty in Afghanistan in general. Capital punishment is legal under both the Afghan penal code and sharia. Even so, the well-known problems […]

Rights and Freedoms Read more

The Asia Foundation’s 2012 survey and how to read opinion polls in Afghanistan

Martine van Bijlert •

On 14 November the Asia Foundation released its 2012 ‘Survey of the Afghan People’, based on data collected by ACSOR (Afghan Center for Socio-Economic Research), a Kabul-based research organisation that has done the data collection for almost all large publicly released opinion polls. It is the eighth survey in its kind: the first was released […]

Political Landscape Read more

Just about over the First Hill: Pakistan’s Release of Afghan Taleban

Thomas Ruttig •

The release of a number of Afghan Taleban by Pakistan, as announced on 14 November, may prove crucial for an urgently needed breakthrough on a political settlement in Afghanistan. It is also the first big personal success for Rabbani Junior at the helm of the Afghan High Peace Council. But too much optimism would be […]

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