Afghanistan Analysts Network – English

Posts tagged: Hazara

Hazara

Obituary for Sultan Ali Keshtmand (1935-2026): Afghanistan’s Soviet-era political leader and Hazara rights advocate

Thomas Ruttig •

Few Afghan politicians from the era of the Soviet-backed People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA) regime combined technocratic skill with a clear focus on combatting ethnic inequality, as Sultan Ali Keshtmand did. Born into a modest Hazara family, he rose to the top echelons of the party, navigating imprisonment, internal PDPA purges and shifting Soviet […]

Context and Culture Read more

The Politics of Survival in the Face of Exclusion (2): The Emirate’s accommodation and suppression of local Hazara commanders

Ali Yawar Adili •

This report examines the Taliban’s incorporation of six Hazara commanders into its ranks and how they have fared since the re-establishment of the Islamic Emirate. Three of the commanders joined the Taliban during the insurgency after fleeing criminal prosecution, while the others assisted the movement’s capture of their locality in 2021. The position of all […]

Political Landscape Read more

The Politics of Survival in the Face of Exclusion: Hazara and Shia actors under the Taleban

Ali Yawar Adili •

Since the Taleban’s return to power, an array of Hazara and Shia Muslim groups and individuals have tried to position themselves vis-à-vis the new order in an effort to protect a community that feels particularly vulnerable. The struggle over who gets to speak for the community has revived old intra-communal rivalries and factionalism, weakened their […]

Political Landscape Read more
A Kuchi winter camp in Goshta district, Nangrahar. Photo: Fabrizio Foschini, 2012.

Conflict Management or Retribution? How the Taleban deal with land disputes between Kuchis and local communities

Fabrizio Foschini •

A series of clashes between local villagers and incoming Pashtun groups in the northern province of Takhar brought the issue of conflict over land back into the spotlight. This is an age-long problem, but the collapse of the Republic shifted local power balances and brought different communities onto the winning side. As a result, many […]

Political Landscape Read more

A Community Under Attack: How successive governments failed west Kabul and the Hazaras who live there

Ali Yawar Adili •

The Hazara-Shia community in west Kabul city, particularly its sprawling neighbourhood Dasht-e Barchi, has been the target of some of the city’s deadliest attacks, especially since 2016. The community has particularly been hit hard in west Kabul, but Hazaras and Shias have also been persistently targeted elsewhere in Afghanistan. While the former government promised to […]

War and Peace Read more

Taleban Attacks on Khas Uruzgan, Jaghori and Malestan (II): A new and violent push into Hazara areas

Ali Yawar Adili • Martine van Bijlert •

The Taleban attacks on Hazara areas in Uruzgan and Ghazni were unprecedented in their reach and led to massive displacement. The attacks indicated a clear shift in the Taleban’s behaviour towards the Hazara areas, stimulating various hypotheses about their motives. In this second part of a series of two dispatches, AAN’s Ali Yawar Adili and […]

War and Peace Read more

Taleban Attacks on Khas Uruzgan, Jaghori and Malestan (I): A new and violent push into Hazara areas

Ali Yawar Adili • Martine van Bijlert •

In late October 2018, the Taleban pushed deeper into Hazara areas than they had ever done before. They first pursued Hakim Shujai, a notorious former Afghan Local Police (ALP) commander, into Malestan, then launched an assault on the district of Jaghori and thereafter attacked Malestan’s district centre, almost resulting in its collapse. The attacks were […]

War and Peace Read more
The large Zabul Seven protests in Kabul, 11 November 2015. Photo: Pajhwok.

The ‘Zabul Seven’ Protests: Who speaks for the victims?

Martine van Bijlert •

On 11 November 2015, Kabul witnessed probably one of the largest demonstrations in recent history. The trigger was the slaughter of seven Hazara travellers who had been taken hostage in Zabul province about a month ago. The demonstration, which continued well into the night, became an amalgam of emotions and agendas: grief and horror over […]

War and Peace Read more
Murad and Sayyed in their neon-lit basement prison in Aleppo, Syria. They are being held by Syrian rebels who want to exchange them, but find no one interested in their prisoners. Photo: screenshot from a video taken by Christoph Reuter

Murad’s War: An Afghan face to the Syrian conflict

Christoph Reuter •

In Syria, the Assad regime is running out of soldiers and is increasingly relying on mercenaries. Many are Shiites – Lebanese Hezbollah militiamen, Iranians, Iraqis, Pakistanis and Yemenis. But no group is represented to the degree that the Afghan Hazara are. AAN guest author Christoph Reuter (*) has met two of them – recruited in […]

War and Peace Read more

The Study and Understudy of Afghanistan’s Ethnic Groups: What we know – and don’t know

Christian Bleuer •

From voting blocs to the share of power in government ministries to the composition of the insurgency, references to ethnic groups are frequently made in reporting and analysis. Accurate analysis requires a careful look at the complicated social lives and local politics in which members of these ethnic groups operate. But what is actually known […]

Political Landscape Read more

Death in Aleppo: A group of Afghan fighters located in Syria

Christopher Reuter •

Are Afghans fighting in the war in Syria? There have been a few reports to that effect in the international news media over the past months, detailing recruitment efforts mainly by the Iranian government among Hazaras in order to bolster the Assad regime’s manpower. However, there has never been evidence of Afghan fighters actually present in […]

War and Peace Read more

A Second ‘Death List’: More on those forcibly disappeared in the civil war

P. Gossman •

After last year’s release of a ‘death list’ containing almost 5000 names of men who ‘disappeared’ in the late 1970s, another list is to be publicly available soon, this time listing 671 men who were forcibly disappeared during the civil war in Kabul in the mid-1990s. The document was put together, at the time, by […]

Rights and Freedoms Read more

AAN accepts donations

Donate