Wall Street Journal, 16 April 2023 Interesting new figures and detail about the Taleban’s tax policy and other revenues – such as: Taxes collected from small businesses have tripled, he said. Places like bus stations, previously in the grip of criminal gangs, are now paying taxes. Revenues from royalties the mining industry pays for minerals they extract are […]
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USIP, 11 April 2023 Useful analysis of the internal Taleban tensions – and a plea not to overrate them and fall into new, too simplistic explanations by Andrew Watkins.
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RFE/RL, 5 April 2023 Interesting analysis of a major Taleban development project, the 285km-long Qoshtepe Irrigation Canal in Jowzjan province, “which will divert large volumes of water from the dwindling transboundary Amu Darya River” and might further stress bilateral relations with two of Afghanistan’s northern neighbours, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan
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Voice of America, 28 March 2023 A portrait of Taleban leader Hebatullah Akhundzada, summarising the little biographic information that is known about him.
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Kabul Now, 23 March 2023 Some interesting figures about Afghanistan’s elderly population and retirees, including IRoA and Taleban budget lines for this group, by the English branch of exile online newspaper Etilaat-e Ruz: Out of an estimated population of 34 million, nearly 1.5 million are older people, with 58.64% being men and 41.36% women. However, […]
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RFE/RL, 21 March 2023 A report about conservation work on Afghanistan’s pr-Islamic heritage, under the pre-Taleban government and under the current second Taleban emirate, with some surprising detail. For example, that the Taleban have involved the Agha Khan Foundation (AKDN) in preserving the buddhist site at the Ainak copper mine. According to Gil Stein, a […]
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Human Rights Watch, 15 March 2023 New report giving a rare insight into the not well-known and abominable situation of “between 2,400 and 2,700 Afghans” who had been evacuated on private chartered flights to Abu Dhabi by the UAE (on the request by the US and possibly other countries) and accommodated in two locations there, […]
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UNOCHA, 23 January 2023 Afghanistan is facing an unprecedented humanitarian crisis with a very real risk of systemic collapse and human catastrophe. In addition to unimaginable human costs, this humanitarian crisis is reversing many of the gains of the last 20 years, including around women’s rights. The end of the 20 year armed conflict between […]
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ILO, 8 March 2023 New ILO figures show that in Afghanistan, in the fourth quarter of 2022, female employment was estimated to have been 25 per cent lower than in the second quarter of 2021, before the Taleban’s second takeover. Male employment levels are down seven per cent in the same period.
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Palladium, 23 February 2023 An extensive reportage from Kabul, with some surprising findings of every-day life: In the bookstores of Kabul, at least, one can still find books by Hillary Clinton and Michelle Obama; contraception and tobacco are available, and the Taliban has yet to regulate internet access like other Islamic governments. One can find gyms and restaurants […]
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The National, 18 February 2023 Two Afghan journalists, Sulaiman Hakemy and Ali Latifi, have re-researched a story that made international headlines: the alleged Taleban ban of contraceptives for women. They found there is no such ban and even managed to get an official response from the Taleban: Dr Sharafat Zaman Amar, spokesman for the Taliban-run […]
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USIP, 25 January 2023 Former World Bank Afghanistan specialist Bill Byrd looks at one the current mot important policy matters: how to deal with the Taleban’s rejection to listen to any advice and keep lives-saving humanitarian work afloat in the middle of what he calls “an economic crisis for the entire country, one likely to […]
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