Amu: Afghanistan — Eight individuals arrested in various provinces, including Kabul, by the Taliban were “tortured and killed” on charges of collaborating with armed opposition groups, sources told Amu on Sunday. According to the sources, the detainees were tortured before being shot. The identities of three victims have been confirmed, and one source provided anRead More...



Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty January 26, 2025 The United States may place a bounty on the top leaders of the Taliban, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on January 25 after finding out that the group may be holding more American hostages in Afghanistan. “Just hearing the Taliban is holding more American hostages than hasRead More...

Afghanistan International: Hayatullah Mohajir Farahi, the Taliban’s Deputy Minister of Information and Culture, defended the group’s ban on the distribution and publication of dozens of books, saying that banning books is a “common practice” in many countries. Farahi added that the Taliban has banned some books in order to build a “single nation” in Afghanistan.Read More...

By RFE/RL’s Radio Mashaal and RFE/RL’s Radio Azadi January 24, 2025 Afghan rights groups have applauded the International Criminal Court’s announcement that it is seeking arrest warrants for two top Taliban officials for allegedly persecuting Afghan women and girls, an accusation the Taliban-run Foreign Ministry called “baseless.” ICC prosecutor Karim Khan said in a statement on January 23 thatRead More...

Amu: Afghanistan’s Ali Reza Asahi, a two-time world bodybuilding champion, on Thursday died due to an illness. He was 49. The National Bodybuilding Federation confirmed Asahi’s death in a statement, adding that his funeral is scheduled for Friday in the Omid Sabz township in Kabul. A celebrated figure in the sport, Asahi won back-to-back goldRead More...

Ayaz Gul VOA News January 23, 2025 Islamabad — Taliban justice officials in Afghanistan said Thursday that 12 people, including two women, had been publicly flogged this week after being tried and charged with adultery, sodomy, eloping, and having “illicit relations.” The regime’s Supreme Court announced the punishments, saying they were carried out in the southeasternRead More...

Afghanistan International: The International Criminal Court’s chief prosecutor on Thursday said that he was seeking arrest warrants against senior Taliban leaders in Afghanistan over the persecution of women, a crime against humanity. Karim Khan said that there were reasonable grounds to suspect that Taliban’s Supreme Leader Hibatullah Akhundzada and the group’s Supreme Court’s chief justiceRead More...

Amu: The Taliban’s Security and Clearance Commission on Wednesday, January 22, in its annual report, named the citizens of Tajikistan and Pakistan as the main perpetrators of attacks in Afghanistan. In the report, the Taliban claimed that the attacks were “mainly designed outside Afghanistan”. Click here to read more (external link).

VOA News January 22, 2025 Washington — President Trump’s executive order suspending the U.S. refugee program would affect the resettlement of thousands of Afghans who helped the U.S. during the war in Afghanistan, an advocacy group said. AfghanEvac, a California-based coalition of organizations helping U.S. Afghan allies to resettle in the U.S., said Monday that theRead More...

Ayaz Gul VOA News January 21, 2025 Islamabad — Taliban authorities in Afghanistan announced Tuesday the release of two American nationals as part of a prisoner exchange for one of their members, who was held in the United States on narcotics-terrorism charges. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Kabul identified the freed Afghan as Khan MohammadRead More...

Khaama: U.S. President Donald Trump has issued an executive order suspending the country’s refugee admission program for at least three months. The White House stated that resumption depends on aligning refugee admissions with U.S. interests. This decision is expected to impact thousands of Afghan migrants. According to the White House on Monday, January 20, theRead More...

Afghanistan International: A senior Republican senator has said that he is concerned about the group’s attack on the United States as the Islamic State grows in Afghanistan and wars spread around the world. Lindsey Graham stressed, “I’ve never been more worried about attacks on my homeland than I am now.” Click here to read moreRead More...



Ayaz Gul VOA News January 20, 2025 Ayaz Gul  — President-elect Donald Trump says that future financial assistance to Afghanistan will be contingent upon the return of U.S. military equipment by the Taliban leaders currently in power. Trump’s remarks at a Sunday rally in Washington on the eve of his January 20 inauguration have heightened uncertaintyRead More...

Ariana: Local officials in Panjshir have announced the discovery of over 1,600 emerald mines in the province, with extraction currently underway at 600 sites. Over the past year, the extraction of emeralds from 600 mines in Panjshir has yielded 100,000 carats, valued at approximately $6.9 million. Click here to read more (external link).

FT: When the Taliban took control of Kabul in 2021, Pakistan’s then-prime minister Imran Khan lauded Afghanistan for breaking “the shackles of slavery”. Khan’s spymaster Faiz Hameed was photographed drinking tea with leaders of the Islamist militant group in a Kabul hotel. But with violence surging to a nine-year high, Islamabad’s hope that the newRead More...

Afghanistan International: John Kirby, the White House National Security Spokesperson, said that the people of Pakistan continue to be victims of terrorist attacks from the Afghan border. Kirby said that the United States will continue to work with Pakistan on counterterrorism. Kirby said at a news conference on Wednesday that Islamabad has never been aRead More...

Afghanistan International: The Afghanistan Security Watch said there were at least 39 security incidents in Afghanistan in December. It said on Thursday that 25 of the incidents had been confirmed by independent sources. According to the Afghanistan Security Watch, the Afghanistan Freedom Front has organised 12 attacks against the Taliban, while the National Resistance FrontRead More...

Khaama: Trump’s Defense Secretary Nominee Calls U.S. Exit from Afghanistan ‘Disastrous’ Amid Biden’s Defense of Withdrawal. Pete Hegseth, Trump’s nominee for U.S. Secretary of Defense, described the manner of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan as “disastrous” just one day after President Joe Biden strongly defended his decision to end America’s involvement in the country. Hegseth,Read More...

By Anjana Pasricha VOA News January 15, 2025 New Delhi — The first high level diplomatic meeting held between India and the Taliban leadership marked a significant step in rebuilding New Delhi’s influence in Afghanistan, according to analysts. They say New Delhi’s growing engagement with the Taliban is prompted by strategic considerations in the Central Asian countryRead More...

Afghanistan International: Mortaza Behboudi, an Afghan-French journalist who was imprisoned by the Taliban for seven months, told France 2 that the Taliban “pulled out his teeth and tortured him with electric shocks and injected fluids into his body”. He said that he was tortured every day during the first three months of his imprisonment. InRead More...

Amu: Internal divisions within the Taliban have resurfaced, as sources report that the Haqqani faction sought to appoint Ahmad Haqqani, the eldest son of Khalil-ur-Rahman Haqqani, as the new minister of refugees. However, the Taliban’s leader, Hibatullah Akhundzada, rejected the request by naming Abdul Kabir, the former deputy chief minister for political affairs, to leadRead More...

Amu: KABUL, Afghanistan — An explosion occurred near the Hanzala Mosque in Kabul’s Shahr-e-Naw neighborhood moments ago, according to local sources. The National Resistance Front has claimed responsibility for the explosion in Kabul’s Shahr-e-Naw neighborhood, alleging that the attack killed two Taliban members, including a commander. In a statement, the group described the attack asRead More...

Al Jazeera: From the 1980s when it backed the mujahideen against the Soviet Union through the first two decades of the 21st century, Pakistan was a primary backer of the Taliban, many of whose leaders found shelter on Pakistani soil. India, by contrast, viewed the group as a Pakistani proxy, shuttering its embassy in KabulRead More...

8am: Over the past two years, the situation of Afghan refugees in Pakistan has increasingly deteriorated, becoming more critical and catastrophic. Thousands of refugees are forcibly deported and subjected to violent and brutal treatment by the Pakistani police. Ignoring the plight of the distressed and those who have sought refuge out of necessity, the PakistaniRead More...

Ayaz Gul VOA News January 12, 2025 ISLAMABAD  — Nobel Peace Prize laurate Malala Yousafzai urged Muslim leaders Sunday not to “legitimize” Afghanistan’s ruling Taliban, accusing them of being the “perpetrators of gender apartheid” and calling for accountability. Yousafzai spoke at the closing session of a Pakistan-hosted international summit on girls’ education in Muslim communities aroundRead More...