Afghanistan

Though just two weeks have passed since the Taliban returned to power in Kabul, fear among masses, as expected, has spread like wildfire across Afghanistan, forcing thousands to run towards the Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, to escape a dreaded future. Unsurprisingly, the Kabul Airport and its surroundings have …

The political developments unfolding rapidly in Afghanistan since the Taliban forcibly seized power in the country reveal convergent positions between Russia and Iran on the militia’s takeover. Moscow and Tehran are among the few capitals in the world that did not express deep concern about the Taliban sweeping across Afghanistan’s …

The idea of peace, for people living in Afghanistan, has remained quite elusive and distant concept for a very a long time. Owing to very vivid conflictual fault lines, the prospect of peace has often been termed as the long road keeping in view the different factors that are entrenched …

The UN Security passed a resolution on Monday that calls for the Taliban to facilitate safe passage for people wanting to leave Afghanistan, allow humanitarians to access the country, and uphold human rights, including for women and children. Thirteen of the 15 ambassadors voted in favour of the resolution, which …

When something completely unexpected happens, we ascribe it to providence. But when there are a series of such occurrences revolving around a single event, it’s but natural to suspect that something’s amiss and in absence of any rational explanation, conspiracy and coverup theories abound. The latest such issue that’s caught …

Billions of dollars of US materiel is now in the Taliban’s hands; but which leader will be taken to task for it, or for anything? “This is effing ridiculous,” we grumbled to each other as we eased our sedan onto the Autobahn. I was a newly minted 2nd lieutenant, accompanied …

The Americans, like the British and the Soviets before them, dug their own graveyard in Afghanistan. The Carthaginian general Hannibal, who came close to defeating the Roman Republic in the Second Punic War, committed suicide in 181 BC in exile as Roman soldiers closed in on his residence in the …

Establishment journalists and politicians are despairingly asking: Why did we fail in our well-meaning efforts to help the Afghan people? What were our mistakes? But they ignore their first mistake: creating the Taliban. The USA’s attempts to dominate Afghanistan and its resources began 40 years ago when Jimmy Carter in …

Turkey, which already hosts more than 300,000 Afghans, has warned it doesn’t have the resources to accept additional migrants from the war-torn country. Turkey cannot accept the influx of migrants fleeing Afghanistan, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu warned on Sunday, as foreign governments scrambled to evacuate their citizens and at-risk …

The Taliban takeover in Afghanistan has encouraged Sunni extremist armed groups in Syria and pro-Iran Shiite militias in Iraq. As the world focuses on the end of the US military presence in Afghanistan and the Taliban’s rapid takeover of most of the country, culminating with the handover of Kabul on …