AFGHANISTAN WEEKLY UPDATE ( 13th Jan – 19th Jan)

13 January 2025

1. The Afghan Liberation Front has claimed to have killed four Taliban fighters in Kunduz province and wounded two other members of the group.  
    
2. The Afghan Liberation Front has claimed to have killed four Taliban fighters in Kunduz province and wounded two other members of the group.  
    
3. Pakistan reported Monday that its security forces raided a “terrorists’ location” in southwestern Balochistan province and killed 27 insurgents during what was described as an intelligence-driven operation.  
    
4. Local sources report the re-arrest of Arif Mosleh, the former government security director in the Rokha district of Panjshir province, by the Taliban in Kabul.  
    
5. Alireza Bigdali, the ambassador of the Islamic Republic, has emphasized the intensification of trade talks and cooperation with the Taliban.  
    
6. Ahmad Bakhshish Ardestani, a member of the Foreign Policy and National Security Commission of the Islamic Consultative Assembly of Iran, said that the Taliban are not adhering to the agreement previously signed with Afghanistan on water.  
    
7. US President Joe Biden has spoken to the families of three Americans held in Taliban prisons and promised their release.  
    
8. Local Taliban officials in Nangarhar say that “Ittehad-e-Nawin” radio has started operating in the province.  
    
9. Local sources in Bamyan say that the Taliban have taken a level-fixing test from their illiterate fighters to distribute graduation certificates to them.  
    
10. Maysa Al-Gharaibawi, the new head of the World Food Program in Iran, has thanked the country’s Foreign Minister, Seyyed Abbas Araqchi, for accepting millions of Afghan refugees.  
     
11. The Statistics and Information Department under the Taliban administration says that since the beginning of the process of distributing electronic ID cards, more than 15 million and 18 thousand people have received this type of ID card.  
     
12. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has announced a $2.6 million Swiss aid to Afghanistan.  
     
13.  Following the increase in the value of the dollar against the Afghani currency, sources say that the Taliban have beaten and arrested six money changers in the Shahzada Palace in Kabul city.  
     
14. The Taliban’s Ministry of Refugees and Repatriates has released 21 Afghans from Pakistani prisons.  
     
15. Local Taliban officials in Herat say that a school was built for 400,000 US dollars. The Taliban Education Department in Herat said in a press release, that the construction of the “Shahid Maulavi Auliya-e-Irfan” primary school in the Guzara district of the province has been completed.  
     
16. Local sources reported that 17 professors at Sheikh Zayed University in Khost province have been dismissed for various reasons and excuses.  
     
17. Local sources reported that Adil Haider, the spokesman for the Khost provincial police command under the previous government, suffered a heart attack and died due to unemployment and economic problems.  
     
18. Local sources in Parwan say that the Taliban have released Mohammad Sharif Ayubi, a doctor in Parwan, from prison.  
     
19. Local sources in Ghazni say that the construction of a motor bridge has been completed at the personal expense of a resident of the province.  
     
20. Local sources in Daikundi say that the Taliban have closed an English language training centre in the Sangtakht-e Bandar district of the province and arrested three teachers.  
     
21. Following the publication of a report by 8Sobh newspaper about the arrest of a young man by the Taliban on charges of “sending a video of snowfall in Panjshir” to the media, the group has forcibly filmed and published a video of him.  
     
22. Sources in Iran say that the government of this country has blocked the bank accounts of refugees in Kerman province and has collected heavy taxes from them.  
     
23. Several employees of government departments under Taliban control in Panjshir are complaining about the mistreatment of them by local officials of the group.  

14 January 2025

1. Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb has pledged to enhance security measures in Pakistan to protect Chinese companies and personnel.  
    
2. Before returning to power in Afghanistan, the Taliban signed an agreement with the Pakistani Taliban, al-Qaeda and other foreign fighters.
    
3. Pakistan will issue yuan-denominated “panda bonds” as early as June to further integrate its capital markets with China’s, a move that will help Beijing in its push to expand the use of the currency, the South Asian country’s finance minister said.  
    
4. The article warns that “India may try to get its foot in the door and attempt to regain the space it previously lost in Afghanistan by deepening its strategic footprint through economic assistance, reconstruction and development projects and relief work.  
    
5. The National Resistance Front (NRF) announced that it attacked the gate of the Taliban’s military prosecutor’s office in Kabul’s 10th district on Tuesday evening, claiming that a Taliban ‘military commander’ was also killed in the incident.  
    
6. Pakistan’s Foreign Secretary, Amna Baloch, met with Roza Otunbayeva, the head of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), to discuss developments in Afghanistan and global efforts to address the country’s humanitarian crisis, according to a statement from Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry.  
    
7. French officials warn of an increase in the smuggling of methamphetamine produced in Afghanistan and Turkey.  
    
8. The Taliban’s Statistics and Information Authority announced that more than 15 million people have been issued electronic ID cards since the start of the distribution of these cards.  
    
9. The German Foreign Ministry said in a statement that because of the serious violation of women’s rights in Afghanistan, the country has decided to consider the Taliban responsible for the violation of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Women.  
    
10. The United Nations has formed an economic working group based on the decision of the Doha meeting, which aims to coordinate economic aid to Afghanistan under the control of the Taliban.  
     
11. The Afghanistan Women’s Light of Freedom Movement and the Powerful Women’s Movement of Afghanistan welcomed the declaration of the Conference on Girls’ Education in Pakistan.  
     
12. Alice Jill Edwards, the UN special rapporteur on torture and other inhuman treatment, has said that Ryan Corbett, a US detainee in Afghanistan, needs urgent medical attention.  
     
13. Former Pakistani Prime Minister Anwar ul Haq Kakar has said that NATO’s remaining weapons in Afghanistan have led to an increase in terrorism.  
     
14. 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”.  
     
15. Amid reports of secret discussions between Washington and the Taliban over the release of American prisoners in Afghanistan, a Taliban spokesman has said that the group is ready to exchange prisoners on its terms.  
     
16. The United Nations Population Fund in Afghanistan says that Japan has donated $1.5 million to the country.  
     
17. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has announced that it will launch a new project to strengthen Afghanistan’s health system in cooperation with Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, and Saudi Arabia.  
     
18. The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) has strongly condemned the Taliban’s 18-month prison sentence for Mehdi Ansari, a reporter for the Afghan News Agency.  
     
19. US President Joe Biden, in a phone call with the families of three Americans detained by the Taliban, said that there is no agreement for their release.  
     
20. Local sources in Herat say that the Taliban have ordered that female news anchors not read the news on television due to “incitement against us” and “incitement against men.”  
     
21. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has announced that $279.7 million in funding is needed to provide health assistance in Afghanistan.  
     
22. The Afghan Women’s Freedom Lighthouse Movement has called for the creation of scholarships for women and girls who have been deprived of education.  
     
23. Former Pakistani Prime Minister Anwarul Haq Kakar says that NATO’s remaining weapons in Afghanistan have led to an increase in terrorism in the region. 

15 January 2025

1. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) says that snowfall and cold weather in the first half of January have claimed the lives of five people in Afghanistan.  
    
2. In a meeting with Faisal Talq Al-Baqmi, Chargé d’Affaires of the Saudi Arabian Embassy in Kabul, Taliban Interior Minister Sirajuddin Haqqani emphasized the expansion of political relations.  
    
3. Amir Khan Muttaqi, Taliban Foreign Minister, says he had constructive discussions with the Indian delegation.  
    
4. The National Resistance Front has claimed that it killed two Taliban fighters and wounded another in an attack on them in Kapisa province. The front added in a press release that it attacked a Taliban military base in the Alasay district of Kapisa two days ago.  
    
5. The National Resistance Front has claimed that the explosion in Shahr-e-Naw, Kabul, was the work of this front and that two Taliban fighters were killed in the aftermath.  
    
6. Asim Munir, the Chief of Army Staff of Pakistan, has announced that the only issue of dispute between the Taliban and this country is the presence of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) in Afghanistan.  
    
7. Pete Hegsett, US President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for the country’s Department of Defense, has attributed the October 7th Hamas attack on Israel to the United States’ withdrawal from Afghanistan.  
    
8. The Guardian newspaper has reported that after the United States withdrew from Afghanistan, Afghans eligible for relocation are still stranded and without a destination in foreign camps.  
    
9. The Taliban Ministry of Refugees and Repatriates has announced the release of 14 Afghans from Pakistani prisons.  
    
10. Local sources in Herat say that following the increase in the dollar price against the Afghani currency, the Taliban have asked money changers not to publicize the dollar rate.  
     
11. Local sources report the arrest of a former soldier by the Taliban in Kabul city. Sources said that the Taliban arrested this person on Tuesday, January 15, from the Sarai Shambala area of ​​Kabul city and transferred him to an unknown location.  
     
12. Local sources in Panjshir say that a member of the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan has died under Taliban torture in the group’s prison.  
     
13. Tsukada Tamaki, Japanese Ambassador to Tehran, and Yumiko Takashima, representative of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, visited Iran’s humanitarian services to Afghan refugees at the Dogharun border.  
     
14. Local sources in Balkh say that two people were killed and eight were injured in an explosion tonight in the city of Mazar-e-Sharif, the capital of the province.  
     
15. The National Resistance Front (NRF) announced that it attacked the gate of the Taliban’s military prosecutor’s office in Kabul’s 10th district on Tuesday evening, claiming that a Taliban ‘military commander’ was also killed in the incident.  
     
16. Zhao Xing, China’s ambassador to Kabul announced that ‘some parties’ are trying to prevent the expansion of China’s diplomatic relations with the Taliban.  
     
17. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov called for India to join the Quartet with China, Pakistan and Iran on the issue of Afghanistan.  
     
18. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said that heavy snowfall and rain in the past two weeks have caused loss of life and property in Kunar, Laghman, Nuristan, Faryab and Baghlan provinces.  
     
19. Amir Khan Muttaqi, the Taliban’s foreign minister, at the fourth coordination meeting between the Taliban and UN agencies, emphasised the continuation of the international community’s assistance to Afghanistan according to the needs of the people.  
     
20. The United Nations announced that more than 500,000 children in Afghanistan are at risk of malnutrition this year.  
     
21. The head of the Taliban’s embassy in Islamabad in a meeting with the head of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) called for the organisation’s support for the rights of Afghan refugees against harassment by Pakistani police.  

     

16 January 2025

1. The Taliban Ministry of Public Works says that 53 wagons of commercial cargo have arrived in the country in three trains via the Khaf-Herat railway.  
    
2.  The Taliban Ministry of Refugees and Repatriates has announced the release of 16 Afghans from Pakistani prisons.  
    
3. The Taliban Ministry of Justice has once again emphasized that, based on the order of Haibatullah Akhundzada, the group’s leader, no one is allowed to perform official “government” duties at the same time.  
    
4. The Taliban Foreign Ministry has welcomed the three-phase ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas and emphasized the implementation of this agreement.  
    
5. Iranian President Massoud Pezhikian, in a joint press conference with his Tajik counterpart, Emomali Rahmon, said that they consider the growth and stability of Afghanistan to be in line with their interests.  
    
6. The International Organization for Migration has announced that more than 1.2 million Afghan refugees have returned to Afghanistan from Iran in 2024.  
    
7. Human Rights Watch said in its annual report that the Taliban’s new laws have increased violations of the rights of women and girls.  
    
8. The Afghan Security Monitor has announced that at least 39 security incidents were recorded in Afghanistan in December 2024.  
    
9. Local sources in Takhar say that the Taliban have arrested four of their members on charges of transporting 883 kilograms of drugs in the Yangi Qala district of the province.  
    
10. Mawlawi Noor Jalal Jalali, the Taliban’s Minister of Public Health, met and talked with Ali Reza Bigdali, the Iranian Ambassador to Afghanistan, in his office.  
     
11. 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.  
     
12. Qatar’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that it hosted a joint “labour committee” meeting with Taliban representatives in Doha on Wednesday.  
     
13. Abbas Stanekzai, the Taliban’s deputy foreign minister, stressed the need to control Afghanistan’s waters at the National Conference on Climate Change in Kabul.  
     
14. The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) announced that more than 1.2 million Afghan refugees returned to Afghanistan from Iran in 2024.  
     
15. Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian announced that he had discussed Afghanistan issues with his Tajik counterpart Emomali Rahmon.  
     
16. According to Human Rights Watch’s annual report, the human rights situation in Afghanistan has deteriorated drastically in 2024.  
     
17. The Taliban’s Minister of Water and Energy claimed that in “participatory and partisan governments” in Afghanistan, the construction of water dams was prevented to gain the consent of a tribe or a neighbouring country.  

17 January 2025

1. Hossein Rostaei, the commercial advisor of the Islamic Republic of Iran in Afghanistan, reported that the volume of trade between Iran and Afghanistan has increased by 84% in 2024 to reach 3 billion and 197 million dollars.  
    
2. The Pakistani military said its forces killed eight militants in two raids targeting militant hideouts in restive northwest Pakistan near the border with Afghanistan.  
    
3. Human Rights Watch called on the International Cricket Council to suspend the Afghanistan Cricket Board’s membership and participation in international matches until Afghan women’s rights to education and sports are restored.  
    
4. The Taliban’s Minister of Water and Energy claimed that in “participatory and partisan governments” in Afghanistan, the construction of water dams was prevented to gain the consent of a tribe or a neighbouring country.  
    
5. Lawrence Technical University in the United States has conducted a survey and found that after the Taliban took control of Afghanistan, about 90 per cent of Afghans have faced hunger.  
    
6. The World Bank has announced that hunger and food insecurity in Afghanistan have worsened compared to the past decade.  
    
7. Local sources in Badghis say that Abdul Sattar Sabir, the Taliban security commander in the province, has banned the publication of news, images, and videos by the group’s fighters.  
    
8. The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) says that Afghanistan is one of the last countries where the polio virus is endemic.  
    
9. The Taliban Supreme Court says that Abdul Malik Haqqani, the administrative deputy of the Taliban Supreme Court, has travelled to Tehran as the head of a delegation.  
    
10. Amnesty International issued a statement calling for the immediate release of Afghan refugees from Pakistani police custody.  
     
11. The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Afghanistan Division says that forced and arduous child labour is a clear violation of human rights and human dignity.  
     
12. Local sources report the arrest of one of the former bodyguards of Dr Abdullah Abdullah, head of the High Reconciliation Council in the previous government, by the Taliban in Panjshir.  
     
13. Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said that Afghanistan and Syria want to cooperate with Belarus.  

     

18 January 2025

1. Zia Siraj, the former head of Afghanistan’s National Directorate of Security (NDS), has alleged that al-Qaeda has managed the disputes among Taliban leaders and prevented the group’s collapse.  
    
2. Earlier this month, the ongoing “Independent Inquiry relating to Afghanistan”, which is investigating war crimes committed by UK special forces during the US-led occupation of the country, released material summarising the testimony from seven closed hearings with members of the Special Air Service (SAS)—Britain’s main special forces unit.  
    
3. The European Union announced that it has allocated 36 million euros to support displaced people and Afghan refugees.  
    
4. At his farewell ceremony at the Pentagon, Lloyd Austin, the US Secretary of Defence said that with the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan, “terrible things have happened to Afghan women’s rights”.  
    
5. Amnesty International stated on Friday calling for the immediate release of Afghan refugees held by Pakistani police.  
    
6. The Taliban consulate in Karachi, Pakistan, says it has released 29 Afghans from Pakistani police custody.  
    
7. The European Union Delegation to Afghanistan and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees say they have signed an agreement worth 36 million euros to support Afghan refugees and displaced people.  
    
8. The Central Bank of Afghanistan under Taliban rule says it is auctioning off 18 million US dollars.  
    
9. Local Taliban officials in Nangarhar say that Pakistan has forcibly deported 132 Afghan citizens to Afghanistan through the Torkham crossing.  
    
10. The British government has announced that it has joined the group of countries that have referred the case of violations of the rights of women and girls in Afghanistan to the International Court of Justice.  
     
11. Maulvi Abdul Kabir, the former political deputy to the Taliban Prime Minister, began his work as the group’s Minister of Refugees and Returnees Affairs after nine days.  
     
12. Jan Egeland, Secretary General of the Norwegian Refugee Council, has announced that 22 million people in Afghanistan need humanitarian assistance.  
     
13. CNN on Friday agreed to pay a U.S. Navy veteran an undisclosed sum after a Florida jury found the network liable for defaming him in a segment about evacuation work in Afghanistan.  
     
14. The Salang highway, linking Afghanistan’s capital Kabul to nine northern provinces, has been blocked due to heavy snowfalls, the Ministry of Public Work announced on Saturday.  
     
15. A joint working committee meeting between Afghanistan and Qatar, led by Qatar’s Deputy Minister of Labor and the head of Afghanistan’s Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs employment section, was held in Doha.  
     
16. The Russian foreign ministry has accused Britain and other NATO member states of concealing war crimes and imposing restrictions on investigating war crimes committed by their forces in Afghanistan.  
     
17. Pakistan has announced that it has launched its first observation satellite into space from a space station in China.  
     
18. Belarusian media have reported that the Afghan Taliban and the Syrian Tahrir al-Sham group have sought cooperation with the country, but the Belarusian president says that the situation in the two countries is complicated.  
     
19. The Taliban-controlled Central Bank has announced that it is going to sell 18 million US dollars in a tender.  
     
20. Zia Siraj, the former head of Afghanistan’s National Directorate of Security, has claimed in recent statements that Al-Qaeda is managing the differences among the Taliban and preventing the collapse of the Taliban government.  
     
21. The Taliban have announced the identification of more than 1,500 acres of government land in Sar-e-Pul, and say that the group has identified 1,550 acres of government land in Sar-e-Pul.  

19 January 2025

1. The Afghanistan Freedom Front (AFF) has claimed responsibility for an explosion in the central square of Pol-e-Khomri city, targeting a convoy of Taliban intelligence vehicles.  
    
2. Local sources in Khost say that two TTP fighters have been killed following a drone strike in the province & the aircraft targeted a Pakistani Taliban militant base.  
    
3. Kiyomars Heydari, Commander of the Iranian Army Ground Forces, said that 50 kilometres of fencing along Iran’s border with Afghanistan has been completed.  
    
4. The Freedom Front has claimed to have killed 4 Taliban fighters in an attack on them in Baghlan province. The front announced in a statement on Sunday, that it attacked on January 19 against the Taliban in the central square of Pul-i-Khumri city.  
    
5. A day after the arrest of Mujib, one of the former bodyguards of Dr Abdullah Abdullah, the head of the High Reconciliation Council in the previous government, the Taliban also imprisoned his brother.  
    
6. Local sources in Kunduz say that the Taliban have established about 100 jihadi schools in the Khan Abad district of the province alone in more than three years.  
    
7. Iran’s commercial attaché in Afghanistan has highlighted the ongoing upward trend in trade relations between Tehran and Kabul over the past two years, saying the volume of trade and commercial exchanges between the two countries in 2024 grew by nearly 84% compared with a year earlier.  
    
8. Afghanistan has exported saffron worth over 29 million U.S. dollars over the past nine months, the Ministry of Industry and Commerce’s spokesman Akhundzada Abdul Salam Jawad said Saturday.  
    
9. Masoud Pezeshkian, president of Iran, emphasized the importance of maintaining peace and stability in Afghanistan during a press conference with his Russian counterpart.  
    
10. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Uzbekistan stated that Ismatullah Irgashev, the special representative of the President of Uzbekistan for Afghanistan, met with Ahmed Farooq, the Pakistani ambassador, in Tashkent to discuss the current situation and prospects for bilateral cooperation on issues related to Afghanistan.  
     
11. Human Rights Watch (HRW) in its 2024 annual report expressed concern over what it describes as worsening human rights conditions in Afghanistan.  
     
12. The Taliban has announced that Iran will soon transfer 1,500 Afghan prisoners to Afghanistan. The announcement, made by the Taliban’s Supreme Court, did not provide specific details regarding the timing or conditions of the transfer.  
     
13. Local sources in Kunduz report the arrest of a soldier from the former government’s National Directorate of Security by the Taliban.  
     
14. Several Afghan refugees in Tajikistan are expressing concern about the continued forced deportation of refugees from the country.  
     
15. Jafar Mahdavi, a former member of the Afghan parliament and a figure close to the Taliban, said that reducing or cutting off international aid will lead to the collapse of the Afghan economy.  
     
16. Mike Waltz, National Security Advisor to US President-elect Donald Trump, said that Afghanistan is of great importance to him.  
     
17. The Taliban Supreme Court says it has discussed alternatives to execution with Iranian officials for Afghans sentenced to this punishment.  
     
18. The US Embassy in the Philippines has announced that about 200 Afghan citizens have been transferred to the United States.