South East Asia

Abstract: Six themes emerge from a close examination of the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces’ (ANDSF) collapse in 2021: the ANDSF collapse was months—if not years—in the making; the United States did not give the ANDSF everything they needed to be independently successful; the ANDSF did put up a fierce fight in many areas; the ANDSF were poorly served by Afghan political leaders; the ANDSF were poorly served by their own commanders; and the Taliban strategy overwhelmed and demoralized the ANDSF. From these themes, there are three key lessons: the ANDSF’s failure had many fathers; the U.S. model of security assistance requires reform; and greater emphasis on non-material factors (e.g., morale) is needed in future security force assessments.

Association for Human Rights in Central Asia (AHRCA), International Partnership for Human Rights (IPHR) and the Norwegian Helsinki Committee (NHC) are concerned about the fates of a group of Afghan refugees comprised of journalists, human rights defenders, parliamentary deputies, musicians and artists and their families from Afghanistan who face the threat of forcible return from Uzbekistan to their native country, in violation of the principle of non-refoulement under international human rights law. The group of people, over 70 in total, are currently in Uzbekistan on temporary visas, which expire on 11 November 2021, after which they might be sent back to Afghanistan unless they succeed in legalizing their status in Uzbekistan or are resettled to a safe third country prior to this. The group of refugees fled to Uzbekistan in August 2021, as part of a wave of refugees who left Afghanistan for Uzbekistan after the Taliban came to power in their native country.

In Kamdesh, Nuristan, where U.S. forces withdrew more than a decade ago, the American presence is a distant – and negative – memory for many locals.

In the dead of night on August 30, 2021, the last U.S. forces stepped off the tarmac of Kabul Airport onto a plane and left Afghanistan. It was almost 20 years after the first U.S. forces entered Afghanistan in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, to go after al-Qaida and topple the Emirate of the Taliban that sheltered them. In a twist that would have been unimaginable back in late 2001, by the time the U.S. left the Taliban again held sway in the capital Kabul and practically in the whole of Afghanistan – a feat that they did not even achieve at the prior height of their power in September 2001.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has said the Islamic State (IS) militant group has thousands of fighters in northern Afghanistan, as Moscow prepares to host international talks next week on the situation in the country.

“According to our intelligence, the number of (IS) members alone in northern Afghanistan is about 2,000 people,” Putin said on October 15 during a video address to the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) summit of ex-Soviet states.

China wants to invest billions of dollars in Afghanistan if the Taliban guarantee security for their workers and their assets. This, according to the Taliban’s acting Deputy Minister of Information and Culture Zabihullah Mujahid, who also said his government is ready to deliver.

With the Taliban in power in Afghanistan, there’s a new enemy ascending.

The Islamic State group threatens to usher in another violent phase. Except this time the former insurgents, the Taliban, play the role of the state, now that the U.S. troops and their allied Afghan government are gone.

The Taliban promised the United States to keep the extremist group in check during successive rounds of peace talks. Under the 2020 U.S.-Taliban accord, the Taliban guaranteed that Afghanistan would not become a haven for terrorist groups threatening the U.S. or its allies.

On the banks of a mountain river outside Tajikistan’s capital, in a resort area teeming with hotels and dachas, stands a modern, two-story building flanked by towering trees and lattice fence panels.

The state-owned sanatorium near Dushanbe is usually reserved for high-ranking Tajik officials who flock there on weekends or for short vacations.

At least 100 worshippers have been killed or injured after a suicide bomber targeted a Shia mosque, in the northern Afghan city of Kunduz, according to news reports, during Friday prayers.

The UN chief condemned the “horrific” attack “in the strongest terms”, noting that it represents the third assault on a religious institution, in less than a week.

Afghanistan and Tajikistan share a 1,400-kilometer border. Recently, a war of words has erupted between Tajikistan’s President Emomali Rahmon and the Taliban government in Kabul. Rahmon censures the Taliban for the destabilization of Central Asia by the export of militant groups, while the Taliban leadership has accused Tajikistan’s government of interference.