Afghanistan

The Taliban announced their caretaker cabinet 24 days after taking control of Kabul, but more than half of the cabinet members are on the UN sanction’s list. The Taliban seized capital Kabul on August 15 hours before President Ghani fled the country and they are now in full control of …

The U.S. and international partners should navigate carefully but proactively or risk making a dire economic and humanitarian situation worse. The Taliban’s unexpectedly rapid and complete victory over the now defunct Islamic Republic of Afghanistan brings with it yet another shock to the long-suffering Afghan people and the country’s very …

How will the U.S., international community and the region engage with a government comprised of Taliban stalwarts? As part of the Taliban’s bid to re-establish the “Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,” the militant group announced the line up for its caretaker government on Tuesday. Despite several leading Taliban figures saying the …

German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas has reiterated that Germany wants to reinstate their embassy in Kabul. “Of course we want to reopen an embassy in Kabul. We need diplomatic representation on the ground,” Maas told reporters after meeting with Libyan Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibeh on Thursday. “It always depends …

While the West views the fall of the US-backed government as a strategic disaster, Ankara plans to turn the crisis there to its own advantage. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on August 29 that Turkish diplomatic activity will continue in Kabul and all its embassy staff had returned to …

Ein Kabinett nur aus Mitgliedern der Taliban, der Ministerpräsident auf einer Sanktionsliste der UN, der Innenminister ein vom FBI gesuchter Terrorist, fast alle Minister Paschtunen und keine Frau darunter – weiter von den „inklusiven“ Vorstellungen des Westens kann man kaum entfernt sein als mit dieser neuen Übergangsregierung in Afghanistan. Sie …

NATO’s war in Afghanistan is over. Over the last three weeks, the US and her allies – including Ireland – have evacuated over 120,000 people from Kabul International Airport. On Tuesday night, Major General Chris Donahue of the 82nd Airborne Division became the last US soldier to quit Afghan soil. …

Without a diplomatic presence on the ground in Kabul, the United States will engage with the Taliban from a remote mission in Doha. With the US military withdrawn from Afghanistan, the focus has shifted to what Secretary of State Antony Blinken has billed as the next chapter of America’s engagement …

Abstract: Twenty years after 9/11, with the United States withdrawn from Afghanistan, the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, and a shift in focus and resources to great power competition, jihadi terrorism appears to have been demoted to a second-tier priority. But complacency is dangerous. While al-Qa`ida and the Islamic …

Abstract: President Biden’s decision to withdraw U.S. forces from Afghanistan depended on a critical assessment of the terrorism landscape in Afghanistan. At the time of his decision, he argued that the terrorism threat from Afghanistan was both low and manageable for the foreseeable future. This article argues that the Biden …