Tag Archives: Herat

Taliban go door-to-door telling fearful Afghans to work

(Reuters) – Armed Taliban members knocked on doors in cities across Afghanistan on Wednesday, witnesses said, telling fearful residents to return to their jobs a day after the militants announced they wanted to revive the country’s battered economy.

Widespread destruction during a 20-year war between U.S.-backed government forces and the Taliban, the drop in local spending due to departing foreign troops, a tumbling currency and lack of dollars are fueling economic crisis in the country.

In their first press conference since seizing the capital Kabul, the Taliban on Tuesday promised peace, prosperity, and appeared to depart from previous rules of banning women from work. But many people remain wary.

Wasima, 38, said she was shocked when three Taliban members with guns visited her home in the western city of Herat on Wednesday morning. They took down her details, enquired about her job at an aid organization and her salary and told her to resume working, she said.

A dozen people told Reuters there had been unannounced visits from the Taliban in the past 24 hours, from the capital Kabul to Lashkar Gah in the south and northern Mazar-i-Sharif.

They did not wish to give their full names, for fear of reprisals.

As well as encouraging people to work, some said they also felt the checks were designed to intimidate and instill fear of the new leadership.

A Taliban spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the visits.

Many businesses in the capital Kabul remain closed and large parts of the city have been deserted since the Taliban captured it on Sunday at the end of a lightning sweep across the country.

The only major traffic in the usually congested capital was at the airport, where people are trying to flee the country aboard diplomatic evacuation flights, residents said.

Seventeen people were injured in a stampede there on Wednesday, and the Taliban said they fired in the air to disperse crowds.

At Tuesday’s press conference, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said the Islamist movement was seeking good relations with other countries to allow economic revival and “prosperity to come out of this crisis.”

But some are skeptical of the Taliban, who during their previous rule from 1996-2001 dictated that women could not work and girls were not allowed to attend school, and imposed punishments such as public stoning.

Presenter Shabnam Dawran said in a video shared on Twitter on Wednesday that she was turned away from her job on Afghanistan’s state-owned Radio Television Afghanistan.

“They told me that the regime has changed. You are not allowed, go home,” she said.

The Taliban and the news organization did not immediately comment on the incident.

Wasima, who watched the Taliban’s news briefing with her two daughters, said she feared that opportunities for women would diminish under the Taliban, even if they were now urging her back to work.

“The Taliban say women should work but I know for a fact that opportunities will shrink,” she said.

(Reporting by Kabul newsroom and Rupam Jain; Writing by John Geddie; Editing by Mike Collett-White)

Afghan commander Ismail Khan captured as Taliban seize Herat

KABUL (Reuters) – Taliban insurgents have seized most of Herat, Afghanistan’s third largest city, and also captured Ismail Khan, the veteran local commander leading militia resistance there, local officials said on Friday.

The fall of Herat, the latest in a series of major provincial cities to be taken by the Taliban in the past few days, has dealt a shocking blow to the government of President Ashraf Ghani only weeks after the withdrawal of U.S. forces.

One official said Afghan government forces had agreed to withdraw from Herat airport, 15 km (nine miles) from the city, and the Army Corps commander’s headquarters, the last centers under their control. However other sources said Afghan forces were still at the airport as of 1 p.m. local time (0830 GMT).

“The Taliban agreed that they will not pose any threat or harm to the government officials who surrendered,” said provincial council member Ghulam Habib Hashimi.

As fighting subsided, the streets fell silent in Herat, a major economic hub of about 600,000 people close to the border with Iran and over centuries one of the historic centers of Persian culture.

“Families have either left or are hiding in their houses,” said Hashimi, who described Herat as a “ghost town”.

Herat has seen increasingly heavy fighting with popular militia groups serving alongside regular army units as Taliban pressure on the city mounted following the U.S. pullout.

Khan, the most prominent militia commander and believed to be in his 70s, together with the provincial governor and security officials, were handed over to the Taliban under an agreement, Hashimi told Reuters. He had no details of the deal.

Khan’s capture, confirmed by Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid, provided one of the most potent symbols of the crumbling of resistance in the city.

Photos and videos showing the eminent commander apparently in the hands of the insurgents were widely shared on social media although they could not immediately be verified.

Ismail Khan is widely known as the Lion of Herat. His involvement in Afghanistan’s wars goes back to the anti-government uprising that helped trigger the 1979 Soviet intervention, and his return to the front lines a month ago was a clear sign of the growing threat to Herat.

(Reporting by Kabul staff, writing by Raju Gopalakrishnan, editing by Mark Heinrich)

Resurgent Taliban take provincial capital, kill Afghan gov’t spokesman

KABUL (Reuters) -The Taliban captured an Afghan provincial capital and assassinated the government’s top media officer in Kabul on Friday, dealing twin high-profile blows to the Western-backed administration.

A police spokesman in southern Nimroz province said the capital Zaranj had fallen to the hardline Islamists because of a lack of reinforcements from the government.

Fighting to reimpose strict Islamic law after their 2001 ousting by U.S.-led forces, the Taliban have intensified their campaign to defeat the U.S.-backed government as foreign forces complete their withdrawal after 20 years of war.

The insurgents have taken dozens of districts and border crossings in recent months and put pressure on several provincial capitals, including Herat in the west and Kandahar in the south, as foreign troops withdraw.

Zaranj was the first provincial capital to fall to the group since the United States reached a deal with the Taliban in February 2020 for a U.S. troop pullout. A local source said the Taliban had seized the governor’s office, the police headquarters and an encampment near the Iranian border.

Taliban sources said the group was celebrating, and Zaranj’s fall would boost the morale of their fighters in other provinces. A Taliban commander, speaking on condition of anonymity, said it has strategic importance as it is on the border with Iran.

“This is the beginning and see how other provinces fall in our hands very soon,” he said.

In Kabul, Taliban attackers killed Dawa Khan Menapal, head of the Government Media and Information Centre, in the latest in a series of assassinations aimed at weakening President Ashraf Ghani’s democratically elected government.

‘AN AFFRONT’

In a tweet, U.S. Charge d’Affaires Ross Wilson said he was saddened and disgusted by the death of Menapal, whom he called a friend who provided truthful information to all Afghans.

“These murders are an affront to Afghans’ human rights & freedom of speech,” he said.

Scores of social activists, journalists, bureaucrats, judges and public figures fighting to sustain a liberal Islamic administration have been assassinated by Taliban fighters in a bid to silence voices of dissent in the war-torn country.

An official in the federal interior ministry said “the savage terrorists killed” Menapal during Friday prayers.

“He (Menapal) was a young man who stood like a mountain in the face of enemy propaganda, and who was always a major supporter of the (Afghan) regime,” said Mirwais Stanikzai, a spokesperson for the interior ministry.

Elsewhere Taliban fighters intensified clashes with Afghan forces and attacked militias allied with the government, officials said, stretching their dominance of border towns and closing in on two provincial capitals.

At least 10 Afghan soldiers and a commander of armed members belonging to the Abdul Rashid Dostum militia group in the northern province of Jowzjan were killed.

“The Taliban launched violent attacks on the outskirts of (provincial capital) Sheberghan this week and during heavy clashes a pro-government militia forces’ commander loyal to Dustom was killed,” said Abdul Qader Malia, the deputy governor of Jowzjan province.

Another provincial council member said nine of the 10 districts of Jowzjan were now controlled by the Taliban and the contest to control Sheberghan was under way.

(Reporting by Afghanistan bureau, Writing by William Maclean;Editing by Nick Macfie and Andrew Cawthorne)

Taliban target provincial Afghan cities in response to U.S. strikes, commanders say

KABUL/PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) – Taliban militants have switched strategy from targeting rural areas of Afghanistan to attacking provincial cities, in response to increased U.S. air strikes after the United States said it was ending its longest war, three militant commanders said.

The Taliban have stepped up their campaign to defeat the U.S.-backed government as foreign forces complete their withdrawal after 20 years of conflict.

A regional U.S. commander said late last month the United States had increased air strikes to counter growing Taliban attacks, a move condemned by the Islamist group.

Fighting has been particularly heavy inside the city of Herat, near the western border with Iran, Lashkar Gah, capital of Helmand province in the southwest, and Kandahar in the south.

The three Taliban commanders, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told Reuters that they were focused on capturing Herat and Kandahar, with Lashkar Gah in their sights.

“Mullah Yaqoob argued that when U.S. didn’t fulfill their commitment why should Taliban be made to follow the accord?” said one of the commanders, based in Kandahar, referring to the group’s military chief.

“Mullah Yaqoob has decided to capture Kandahar and Herat and now Helmand and then it could be Kunduz, Khost or any other province,” said the commander, saying the military leader’s arguments had won over the group’s political office.

A Taliban spokesman did not respond to a request for comment. Taliban negotiator Suhail Shaheen told Reuters the group was continuing its policy of seizing control of rural areas and implementing Islamic Sharia there, rather than focusing on cities.

The Taliban, who ruled with an iron hand from 1996 until 2001, had said previously they would focus on lucrative border crossings and large rural areas, though they have encircled and at times entered provincial capitals.

The group has been waging a massive nationwide offensive since April when President Joe Biden announced troops would withdraw by September and as officials warned peace talks in Doha were failing to make substantive progress.

In recent weeks, there have been sustained attacks on Herat, Kandahar and Lashkar Gar, stretching Afghan special forces thin and killing dozens of civilians.

FIGHTING ‘NOT LIMITED TO PERIPHERIES’

“The operations in Kandahar and Herat are very much important to us and our priority is to capture the two crucial airports or airbases in Kandahar and Herat,” the Taliban commander in Kandahar said.

Officials and experts said they saw signs of a change in strategy last month.

“Taliban are pushing against the provincial capitals … not just to exert pressure but to capture them,” said Asfandyar Mir, a South Asia analyst from Stanford University.

“The main evidence is the extent of their breach of these cities. Fighting is not limited to the peripheries any more. This switch in Taliban strategy has been formalized after Eid, though Taliban forces were putting serious pressure on Kandahar even before Eid.”

The Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha was celebrated last month.

Kandahar and Herat are the second- and third-largest cities of Afghanistan by population. Experts said their loss would be a major political blow to the government and could potentially trigger major realignments in favor of the Taliban.

“Capture of Kandahar means a lot to the Taliban. It was their capital and occupying the city is great morale boost for the Taliban… This is something they cherish and for Kandahar, Taliban can risk international ire,” said an Asian diplomatic source closely following the Taliban.

A Western security official said: “The fact they are attacking (cities) is a sharp reaction to air support offered by the U.S. … The Taliban have proven that now they will not just stop with controlling trading points.”

It is not clear whether U.S. airstrikes would continue after foreign forces complete their withdrawal.

A spokesperson for U.S. forces in Afghanistan and the U.S. embassy did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Experts and officials say that for now a military takeover of Kabul would be much more difficult for the Taliban than provincial capitals, but that the group could increase bombings and attacks to undermine security and public morale.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for an attack at the acting defense minister’s residence on Tuesday and warned of further violence.

(Reporting by Kabul/Peshawar newsrooms; Additional reporting by India newsroom; Editing by Nick Macfie)