Afghanistan Analysts Network – English

Reports

Reports – previously known as dispatches – are the flagship of the AAN website and our main type of publication. AAN reports are based on extensive desk and field research and provide timely and in-depth information and analysis.

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 […]

War and Peace Read more

Elections or National Consensus: Which one wins?

Gran Hewad •

The complexity of Afghanistan’s political spectrum and the traditionally overwhelming desire of Afghan leaders to keep power are major elements that have an effect on whether the political transition process – which continues simultaneous with the transition of security responsibilities – will be democratic. The ballot stuffing in the 2009 presidential and 2010 parliamentarian elections […]

Political Landscape Read more

The Morphing of the Andar Uprising: Transition to Afghan Local Police

Emal Habib •

The much-publicised anti-Taleban ‘uprising’ in Ghazni’ s Andar district is almost one year old, yet no side has managed to consolidate its control over the area. Violence has not let up during the last 12 months and the year ahead looks set to be just as bloody. Our author, Emal Habib, has been closely following […]

War and Peace Read more

Inspiration in Kabul: Nancy Dupree and the Opening of the Afghanistan Centre

Kate Clark •

The Afghanistan Centre at Kabul University (ACKU) has been officially opened. A beautiful, airy building with a central green courtyard, it has space for both researchers and the Centre’s collection of 80,000 (and increasing) documents collected over the last three decades. The driving force behind the project is Nancy Hatch Dupree who said that ‘for […]

Context and Culture Read more

The ‘Bagram Duck’: Migrant bird killed north of Kabul and offered as game

Kate Clark •

If you drive to the Bagram detention centre, you pass by a row of small shops selling birds. Live finches and other wild song birds hop about in cages which hang among dead game birds on hooks, ready for the pot. The well-watered lands of the Shomali Plain, home to waders, ducks and many other […]

Context and Culture Read more

Despite Growing Ulema Conservatism: Afghans Managed to Celebrate Nawruz

AAN Team •

Increasingly, during the last few years, the millennia-old celebrations of Nawruz, the New Year which starts at the spring equinox, ie around 21 March, has become the object of a religious debate in Afghanistan. Although the spring festivity is a major official holiday and continues to be a popular occasion for families to go on […]

Context and Culture Read more

The Other Guantanamo 5: A New MoU for Bagram and, Finally, a Handover?

Kate Clark •

The Pentagon has announced and the Afghan presidential palace confirmed that the US military will hand over its detention facility at Bagram Airbase to the Afghan authorities tomorrow, 25 March 2013. The presidential spokesman, Aimal Faizy, told AAN the two governments have negotiated a new Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), which, unlike the first MoU on […]

International Engagement Read more

Rancour between the Allies: Karzai speaks to the Americans

Kate Clark •

If the Americans ‘surrender’ to Afghan demands, President Karzai has said, he will sign a bilateral security agreement with them. He told an Afghan audience on national TV that the US wanted bases in Afghanistan – a globally significant country – and, as the audience laughed and applauded, he said: ‘The USA has come and […]

International Engagement Read more

Sal-e Naw Mubarak! Neway kal-mu mubarak!

Kate Clark •

AAN would like to wish all our beloved readers and contributors a peaceful and happy new year. The signs of spring are all about us here in Kabul – blossom on the almond trees, cats a-courting and sunshine, warm and pleasant, is mixed with thunder showers. The mud underfoot is drying to dust in the […]

Context and Culture Read more

A War of Attrition in Farah Province

Fabrizio Foschini •

With the withdrawal of foreign troops taking place countrywide, it is inevitable that not all provinces fare the same, given the differences in insurgents’ and government’s degree of attention. Farah, a province where transition was scheduled late by all standards, has experienced a serious deterioration in security, even before the transition was over. The second […]

War and Peace Read more

The Kabul Bank Tribunal: an exercise in containment

Martine van Bijlert •

The Kabul Bank crisis is complicated and multi-layered. Its tentacles reached into almost all centres of power and threatened to embarrass not just the architects of the scam, but practically everybody involved: businessmen, politicians, senior government officials, the various Presidential campaign teams, Parliamentarians, Central Bank staff, international advisers, donors – the list is long. Since […]

Economy, Development, Environment Read more

Afghanistan’s vain attempts at wooing Pakistani Islamists for peace

Borhan Osman •

The recent assertion by Pakistan’s chief cleric, Tahir Ashrafi, about the permissibility of Taleban’s suicide attacks was completely the opposite of what Afghanistan had been looking for. Indeed, Kabul has had difficulties in mobilising religious leaders to speak against suicide attacks. A long sought conference of ulama from Afghanistan and Pakistan aimed at delegitimising militancy […]

Regional Relations Read more

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