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Pak-Afghan relations have many complications and one of them is Torkham, the porous land border both of them share that is the continuous source of trouble.

Afghanistan being a landlocked country heavily dependent upon access to sea for obtaining all goods and Pakistan has provided a transit corridor for letting them transfer their goods back to their country.

However, the Afghan trade corridor is notorious for malpractices and Pakistani authorities continuously complain about them but keeping in view the sensitivity of the matter the transit facility is not withdrawn.

Since after the Afghan Talibans takeover of Kabul the situation at the borders has exacerbated as Pakistani authorities are deeply concerned about the almost free movement of terrorists they allege get safe treatment in Afghanistan particularly after they undertake any terrorist activity in Pakistan.

The situation at Pak-Afghan border usually remains a source of friction between both the countries and it was in the last month of March that the Torkham border remained closed for many days as a deadlock over starting a dialogue prevailed between border officials of Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The Pakistani side emphasised that the Afghan government unilaterally closed the border crossing and as a matter of principle they should initiate a dialogue if they want the border to be reopened. It was added that additional forces deployed at the border after the recent firing incident had been withdrawn while the Afghan side too reciprocated by pulling back their reinforcement. Meanwhile, it was reported that some informal contacts were made with the Afghan Taliban authorities urging them to send a delegation for talks.

The local trading community and transporters have called for immediate reopening of the border crossing as edible goods worth millions of rupees were at the risk of decomposing. It was reported that hundreds of vehicles were parked at about 17km of roadside stretch from Katakushtha to Torkham which also posed a security risk for transporters.

The reason for the border closure by Taliban was not entirely clear though officials on both sides said they are in discussions to resolve the issue. However, the deadlock finally ended and Pakistani and Afghan authorities agreed to work together to improve and facilitate cross-border trade and pedestrian movement.

The agreement came during a meeting of the Pak-Afghan Border Management Committee in the Afghan customs offices in Gumrak area. The meeting discussed the reasons for the week-long unilateral closure of the Torkham border by Afghan border forces accusing Pakistani forces of manhandling Afghan patients and denying them and their attendants the permission to enter their country without visa.

The Afghan officials also sought entry permission for Afghan vehicles equivalent to Pakistani ones crossing over to Afghanistan as well as for the stranded citizens, who held Afghan cards or Proof of Registration (PoR) cards.

It was also reported that the Afghan authorities requested Pakistani counterparts not to seize the PoRs and Afghan cards and only punch them as most of the returning Afghans, who had lived in Pakistan for decades, were without other identification cards or legal travel documents.

It was also mentioned that the Afghan side also insisted that people of their country, who did not have PoRs or Afghan cards and were returning to Pakistan under the UNHCR voluntary repatriation programme should be granted permission to go back with other family members.

The Afghan authorities insisted that all those issues should be mutually resolved in order to prevent sudden border closures in future. It was added that both sides agreed to make concerted efforts to effectively stop child porters from secretly taking sugar and oranges to Afghanistan and smuggling goods to Pakistan.

It is now reported that a dispute over acquisition of land for the state-of-the-art customs terminal at the Pak-Afghan border at Torkham continues to simmer as construction work paces ahead to complete the project by the end of this year.

The tribal elders allege that the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR), with whom they had originally signed an agreement on the provision of over 300 kanals of their collective land near the Torkham border for the construction of the terminal, had redesigned its structure and also grabbed over 400 kanals of additional land without their consent.

Though the idea of constructing the much-needed terminal was conceived in 2003, the construction work was delayed till 2015 due to the security situation in the region and also a row over the acquisition of the required land which was owned by the Khuga Khel sub-tribe of Landi Kotal.

In this matter the FBR has opted to stay in the background letting the National Logistic Cell (NLC) handle the matter as it had awarded the contract and is also present on ground to execute the construction plan.

The so-called aggrieved tribesmen and a senior JUI-F leader, insisted that they were never taken into confidence about the revised plan of the customs terminal and the subsequent encroachment of over 400 kanals of additional land.

They said that the concerned tribe and the residents of Khyber district were not against the construction of the terminal as it would provide the much-needed employment opportunities to the local people and give impetus to bilateral trade with Afghanistan.

They only demanded a fair deal regarding the acquisition of any additional land for the purpose.

To drive their point home the concerned tribesmen had during a protest rally in Landi Kotal threatening to forcibly stop the terminals construction if their grievances were not addressed within a week.

They, however, failed to muster the required strength to materialise their threat after the expiry of the deadline and opted for a negotiated settlement of the issue. It was reported that five of the nine members of the negotiating team had consented to the provision of additional 404 kanals of their collective land to the FBR and thus there was no question of disputing the agreement and sabotaging the construction of the customs terminal.

The NLC strongly mentioned that not a single inch of the tribal land would be occupied or utilised for the under-construction terminal without lawful authority.

It however pointed out that there was a difference of some 16 kanals of land after the signing of the revised agreement and that too would be satisfactorily settled with revised rates in due course of time.

It was reported that the main highway passing through the centre of the customs terminal was the property of National Highways Authority, while natural stream falling within the terminals jurisdiction was state property and there were also some individual owners of some of the land acquired for the terminal who were duly compensated. The NLC with FBR assistance is planning to conduct the final measurement of the terminal upon its completion by the end of this year and all stakeholders would be invited to see the actual size of the terminal premises.

It was conceded by the NLC that some additional land was acquired as the drawing of the terminal was revised after additional facilities were added to it on the request of the tribal elders and local traders, transporters and customs clearing agents.

At the under construction terminal customs clearance of loaded vehicles would be done under a one-window system while goods declaration procedure could be performed through internet under the WebBasedOne Custom system by the importers and exporters from any part of the country or abroad.

The new terminal will have a cumulative parking facility for at least 500 vehicles which will hugely minimise traffic mess on the main Peshawar-Torkham highway.

The terminal is also designed to offer rapid passenger immigration process, efficient cargo checking and handling alongside e-lanes for even faster clearance and a sufficiently large parking space for at least 500 trucks awaiting clearance.

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The Torkham border row - ARY NEWS

The last lunch for the last president of Afghanistan was vegetable fritters, salad and steamed broccoli.

Nasrullah, the head chef at the presidential palace in Kabul, fried the fritters and steamed the vegetable himself. He tasted it all to make sure it was good it was, although steamed broccoli has a limited range of gastronomic possibility and to prove that no poison had infiltrated President Ashraf Ghanis food.

The precaution was unnecessary. The broccoli and other lunchbox dishes went uneaten that day, Aug. 15, 2021, as the Afghan capital suddenly fell and the Taliban walked in. Mr. Ghani had fled Afghanistan already.

Part of an ethnic group unfavored by the Taliban, Mr. Nasrullah was demoted to vegetable scrubber at the palace. His skills coaxing sweetness out of onions and carrots sauted in sesame oil, of building layers of flavor with raisins and a variety of spices for the favorite lamb and rice dish of another Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, are wasted these days. His new bosses, he said, come from the countryside. They prefer their meat unadorned.

All the Taliban want to eat is meat, meat, meat, he said. No vegetables, no spices.

The shifting tastes at the presidential palace are just one example of how Afghanistan has changed since the Taliban returned to power after more than two decades of insurgency. From once-bustling eateries in Kabul to the frozen mountains shadowing the capital, a nation is having to learn how to survive on less.

Gone are the formal banquets of saffron-stained, rose-scented languor and the protein-bar and light-beer cravings of the American contractors who roamed the secure confines of Kabuls Green Zone diplomatic enclave.

Famine and the hardship it brings have reasserted themselves, too, as a bone-chilling winter has been made more desperate by a dearth of international aid.

About 100 miles from Kabul, along a road that runs through the snowy folds of the Hindu Kush mountains, apricot and peach trees were frosted in ice during a recent visit by Times journalists. So were the beards of shepherds, who led dwindling flocks.

In the blue twilight, after nearly a week in the hills and snows, Jomagul brought his flock to a village for refuge. He recited a shepherds elegy: He started with 45 sheep; 30 remain. Three died the night before. One carcass lay near the road, ringed by traps for the foxes that, like the frost, steal animals from the herd.

Often the sheep are slaughtered, salted and dried for laandi, a kind of jerky that sustains Afghans through the cold. Laandi is favored at the palace with the new crop of Afghan officials. But with the thinning of sheep herds, there is less laandi for the rest of the population. In just two weeks in January, 260,000 head of livestock died, according to the Ministry of Agriculture, Irrigation and Livestock.

Mr. Jomagul, the shepherd, described how he liked to eat laandi in a soup thick with chickpeas, alliums, tomatoes and root vegetables, enlivened by ground ginger, turmeric and coriander. A jolt of dried unripe grapes and two fistfuls exactly two of cilantro, and the soup is done, he said.

It makes you warm from the inside, Mr. Jomagul said. You can face the winter.

This past drying season, when the temperature began to plunge, the shepherd could not prepare laandi for himself and his family. There were no animals to spare.

In Kabul, even middle-class families have cut back on meat. Salaries are down. The government has prevented most women from working.

The old hospitality remains, if subdued by circumstances. Traditionally, hosts serve visitors bowls of dried fruits and nuts: floral-scented green raisins, apricots twisted into sugary helixes, pistachios fat like rosebuds about to bloom. Sometimes there is tea tinted gold by strands of saffron.

Mr. Nasrullah, the palace chef, still puts out offerings for guests. His home, he said, was not grand, not like the ones celebrity chefs in the West inhabited, with gleaming tools and kitchens bathed in light. In the weak glow of a bulb wired to a jug of fuel, during one of many power cuts, Mr. Nasrullah laid out a plate of bread and a pot of cardamom tea on the carpet. He apologized for the limited spread. Everyone wore their winter coats inside.

In other countries, he said, someone who worked at the palace as a chef would have a beautiful life.

His father and uncle were the first to work at the palace, part of the assembly line of feast-making for Mohammad Zahir Shah, the last king of Afghanistan, who was ousted in a coup in 1973. Mr. Nasrullah began his apprenticeship at 15 or 16 years old, scrubbing vegetables and washing dishes.

It was a time of upheaval. Government after government fell in the wake of the Soviet intervention and invasion. Eventually, the anti-Soviet mujahedeen brawled for power, with the Taliban coming out on top in 1996. With the formation of the first Islamic Emirate under the Taliban, Mr. Nasrullahs family decamped to its native Panjshir, a stronghold of the Tajik ethnic group. In the green valley grew apples, walnuts and mulberries.

After American-led forces drove the Taliban from power in 2001 with the help of Tajik and other fighters, Mr. Nasrullah returned to Kabul. He worked for Mr. Karzai, the first U.S.-backed president and a devotee of royal Afghan cuisine. When President George W. Bush dined at the palace, he complimented Mr. Nasrullahs kabuli pulao, the famed national rice and lamb dish, Mr. Karzai told his chef.

President Karzai told me, Even if I want you to prepare a banquet for 100 guests at 11 oclock at night, you will do it successfully, Mr. Nasrullah said.

Yes, I could do it, he added.

During Mr. Ghanis presidency, Mr. Nasrullah was promoted to head chef. But Mr. Ghani, who had part of his stomach removed because of cancer, required smaller meals delivered more often. The grand banquets became rarer, and then disappeared after the summer of 2021.

Since the American military withdrawal and the new governments formation, Mr. Nasrullahs salary has been slashed to less than $150 a month. It has been a while since he has indulged in making his finest dishes. At home, his wife cooks.

But he still recounts the recipe for his kabuli pulao, made in the Uzbek style with sesame oil, gesturing like a conductor. His hands mimic the slicing and stirring, the laying of cloth to steam the long grains of rice with warming spices cardamom, clove, nutmeg, cinnamon and black pepper and onions softened to the hue of the skin of a pear.

In his retelling of the recipe, Mr. Nasrullah might have withheld an ingredient or two. That was a chefs prerogative.

The recipe for pulao is slightly different though still done in the Uzbek style at one popular restaurant in Kabul. On a recent day, hungry men hunched at low tables, waiting for their food. Upstairs, the seating accommodated women. A bukhari stove offered a bit of smoky warmth. Outside, street children kicked dirty snow.

Amanullah, the restaurants pulao master and the son of a man who spent his life cooking only rice and mutton, lifted a conical lid from a vast pot set into a stove. Perfumed steam rose from the rice. In an adjoining, windowless room, two men in fuzzy caps sat cross-legged, threading meat and fat on skewers.

The family that runs the restaurant the Andkhoi Tordi Pulao Restaurant is ethnically Turkmen, not Uzbek, but the pulao is practically the same, they said. (Many Turkmen fled repression in the Soviet Union and settled in Afghanistan, as did many Uzbeks.) Sesame oil pressed in their home province of Jowzjan in northwestern Afghanistan arrives every couple of days by bus, a 15-hour journey. Each day, the restaurant goes through almost 90 pounds of rice, more than 20 pounds of carrots and 15 pounds each of raisins and onions.

Mr. Amanullah has cooked in Kabul for 16 years. He is illiterate, he said, but I know the flavors in my mind.

The restaurants business is down by about 40 percent because most people dont have enough income for dining out. Mr. Amanullah himself hadnt eaten meat at home for 20 days, he said. Many restaurants in Kabul have closed. In public places, the authorities have indicated that music is no longer welcome, and men and women are generally disallowed from dining together.

Still, the restaurant survives. There are enough customers who pine for the pulao.

People need to eat, Mr. Amanullah said.

Kiana Hayeri and Zabihullah Padshah contributed reporting.

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Under the Taliban, Afghanistan Is Trying to Make Due With Less - The New York Times

From 2001 to 2021, Western-style democracy was forcibly introduced in Afghanistan. Ashraf Ghanis Afghan government, which the Taliban fought against, was weakened by deep internal divisions, infighting and rampant corruption.

The democratic government had strong support from the international community, but the results were very modest. Billions of dollars have been invested in Afghanistans democracy. The US Congress alone allocated more than 146 billion dollars for the reconstruction of the country and the establishment of a democratic order. Although progress has been made in almost all fields, Afghanistan remains one of the poorest and most corrupt countries in the world.

The Trump administration retained 2,500 US troops ahead of the full military withdrawal the US committed to under the US-Taliban accord of February 2020. US officials pledged to continue providing financial support to government forces. At the same time, the Taliban were arguably at their strongest since 2001.

Weeks after new President Joe Biden confirmed that international forces would leave Afghanistan by the fall of 2021, Taliban troops began conquering large swaths of the country. The Talibans advance was achieved through struggle and negotiations. While the Taliban faced strong resistance from government forces in some areas, others were captured with minimal resistance. Often, the Taliban secured the surrender and departure of government forces by paying bribes or through local elders who wanted to avoid bloodshed.

Afghan President Ashraf Ghani, whose seven-year tenure has been marked by an electoral crisis, pervasive corruption and a gradual weakening of the military, fled the country on August 15 for the UAE. On the same day, Taliban fighters began entering Kabul, taking control of the entire country. Today, a year and a half later, the most significant characteristics of the Taliban regime can be listed.

On September 7, 2021, the Taliban announced the establishment of an interim government to rule Afghanistan. The Taliban call their government, as they have done before, the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. The Taliban, who did not adopt a constitution during their first rule, announced that they intended to rule according to Islamic law (Sharia), although they remained vague.

Haibatullah Akhundzada, the leader of the Taliban, has held supreme power as an emir since 2016. He had only a few recorded public appearances. Almost all members of the government are former officials from the previous government in the 1990s or longtime loyalists. All are men, the vast majority are ethnic Pashtuns (the largest ethnic group in the country) and most are from southern Afghanistan.

More than half of the governments members are under US or UN sanctions for links to terrorism, including Interior Minister Sirajuddin Haqqani. The State Department has for years offered a reward of up to $10 million for information leading to his arrest. Haqqani is the head of the Haqqani Network, an Islamist organization designated as a terrorist organization by the US for carrying out numerous attacks on US and other international targets in Afghanistan.

In the early days of the new regime, some observers hoped that the Taliban might turn to former Afghan government officials or others outside their movement in line with their promise to establish an inclusive government. The Taliban, however, have not fulfilled that promise and are filling positions in the government and ministries with military or religious figures with little professional experience, worsening the already bad situation in the country.

There are also strong internal frictions and tensions that threaten additional destabilization. Points of tension exist between politicians (such as First Deputy Prime Minister Abdul Baradar) and its military leaders (Haqqani et al) over who deserves the most credit for the victory. Tensions are strong between the leadership that strives for stability and ordinary fighters who want to adapt to post-war life, but also between those with different ideological perspectives and different ethnic identities. In a speech in February, Haqqani criticized the monopolization of power within certain Taliban circles, prompting other Taliban figures to say that criticism should be made in private.

Discrimination and violence against minority communities in Afghanistan are not new, but under the new Taliban regime, minorities suffer the most. Under Taliban rule, minority groups in Afghanistan experience systematic discrimination based on gender, ethnicity, language and religion. The Taliban are Sunni Muslims and have a long history of persecuting minority religious groups including Christians, Hindus, Sikhs and Shia Muslims. The Taliban are mainly members of the Pashtun ethnic group and speak the Pashto language. Minority ethnic groups include Hazaras, Tajiks and Uzbeks, many of whom speak the Dari language. There have been reports of extrajudicial killings of minority groups across the country. The Taliban, both legally and illegally, kill members of minority groups, especially Hazaras and Tajiks.

Afghan human rights fighters, especially women, face arbitrary arrests and torture, abductions, gang rapes, psychophysical abuse, house searches, and physical threats of violence against family members. Public space is tightly controlled by the Taliban, who have overturned the Constitution and turned to a radical interpretation of Islamic law.

In November 2022, judges were ordered to begin enforcing Sharia law, which includes public floggings and executions. The absence of a judicial system leaves no guarantee or space for citizens to exercise their social and political rights through protests. The Taliban intimidated journalists and restricted press freedom, leading to the closure of more than 200 news outlets.

In the list of 50 countries that oppress Christians the most, Afghanistan ranks high in 9th place. After the Taliban took over, Christians found themselves in extreme danger, as accurately described by the US governments religious agency. Many fled and sought asylum, while those Christians who remained in the country reported that they were hiding from the Talibans actions. The Taliban falsely claim that there are no more Christians in Afghanistan. There are probably around 10 to 12 thousand of them. The former first lady from 2014 to 2021, Rula Ghani, is a Maronite Christian from Lebanon. Child marriage rates have also increased.

Although the Talibans takeover has reduced the high levels of violence that characterized the war, the Talibans return to power has had a significant negative impact on Afghan women and girls. In a September 2022 report, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Afghanistan said: In no other country have women and girls disappeared so quickly from all spheres of public life, nor are they disadvantaged in every aspect of their lives .

After taking power, the Taliban closed down the Ministry of Womens Affairs, which was part of the former Afghan government, and re-established the Ministry of Promotion of Virtues and Prevention of Vices, as in the 1990s. The ministry has issued guidelines that impose new restrictions on women. The December 2021 restrictions include a ban on driving long distances or flying without a male guardian. The May 2022 decree prescribes penalties for male relatives of women who do not wear a full-body hijab. The November 2022 decision prohibits women from entering public parks and swimming pools.

The Taliban banned girls from attending secondary schools. The education of girls is a matter of contention within the Taliban leadership. Some hardliners like Akhundzad support it while Baradar and Haqqani support secondary education for girls. The influence of traditionalists and reluctance to make pragmatic decisions is visible, which shows that the international community has limited influence on the Talibans decisions. Some Afghan women continued to provide informal education to girls in clandestine schools.

In December 2022, the Taliban banned girls from attending college. In the same month, the Taliban also banned women from working for national and international NGOs, threatening NGOs that did not comply with this decision. In response, an estimated 94% of Afghan NGOs have completely or partially ceased operations, and 11 American NGOs have suspended operations in the country. The ban was unanimously condemned by the UN Security Council. Women are mostly prohibited from working, which according to the UN will lead to a 5% drop in GDP.

It is the economy that is the cancer of Afghanistan. The return of the Taliban has exacerbated one of the worlds worst humanitarian crises, as Afghanistan is one of the worlds poorest countries dependent on foreign aid. International donors provided billions of dollars annually in support to the former Afghan government, financing more than half of its annual budget of $6 billion and as much as 80% of total public expenditures.

Much of that development aid was cut off in August 2021, causing the nations GDP to drop by as much as 35% in 2021 and 2022. The UN Secretary-Generals Special Representative for Afghanistan said in December 2022 that the Talibans economic governance was more effective than expected, due to lower corruption, higher revenue collection and the relative stability of Afghanistans currency. However, the economy continues to rely on international donations, including the UN, which sent $1.8 billion in humanitarian aid in cash between December 2021 and January 2023.

The economic situation in the country was bad even before the Taliban due to war, drought and the Covid-19 pandemic, and the Talibans incompetence further worsened the situation. More than half of Afghanistans 39 million people faced acute food shortages in October 2021. Human Rights Watch reported in November 2021 that Afghanistan is facing widespread hunger due to an economic and banking crisis.

Experts from the UN agency World Food Program stated at the beginning of this year that 90% of Afghans do not have enough food to live on. The vast majority of Afghans live in poverty. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs reported that 26.1 million Afghans received at least one form of aid in 2022 and that the outlook remains poor given the predicted droughts and high commodity prices.

Although the Talibans takeover of power in August 2021 was swift, their triumph, according to many analysts, reflected not so much popular support for the movement as a lack of support for the former government. Many elements of Afghan society, particularly in urban areas, appear to view the Taliban with skepticism, fear or hostility.

A small number of citizens nonviolently demonstrated advocating their rights and expressing opposition to the regime. The Taliban violently dispersed these protests and openly suppressed dissent. The regime is currently facing armed resistance from two very different groups. The first is the National Resistance Front (NRF), made up of people associated with the overthrown democratic government. NRF leaders have appealed for US and international support and have maintained a representative office based in Washington.

It is interesting that, unlike some other leaders dear to the West, such as Juan Guaido, the leader of the NRF, Ahmad Massoud, did not receive the explicit public support of any foreign country, let alone the recognition of the leader of the government in exile. This is due to the Talibans relatively strong military position and the Talibans close ties to regional powers, including some that previously opposed them in the 1990s, such as Russia and Iran.

In addition, strategically speaking, Taliban Afghanistan is not something that worries the Americans who knew very well what would happen when they withdrew their army. The NRF has claimed responsibility for numerous attacks on Taliban fighters, mostly in and around the northeastern province of Panjshir. However, the NRF appears to have neither the military capabilities nor the broad popular support needed to seriously threaten the government in Kabul.

Another group, undeniably militarily more dangerous, consists of the local branch of the Islamic State the Islamic State of Khorasan Province (ISKP), also known as ISIS-K, a longtime opponent of the Taliban. The ISKP has opposed the Taliban since its founding in 2015 because it is bothered by the Talibans nationalist political project focused on Afghanistan, which is opposed to ISISs universalist vision of a global jihad that should ultimately lead to the Vatican becoming a Muslim place, as Bosnian Islamist Bilal puts it Bosnian.

Since the Taliban took over, ISKP ranks have grown to as many as 6,000 fighters despite the Taliban offensive. At least 16 terrorist attacks were carried out by the ISKP between August 2021 and September 2022 against the Hazara minority Shiite community in mosques, schools and workplaces, killing more than 700 people. An attack was also carried out on a Sikh place of worship, which undermined the Talibans assurance that it would provide security to all ethnic communities. Attacks on the embassies of Russia (September 2022), Pakistan (December 2022) and a hotel housing Chinese diplomats and executives (also December 2022) make a mockery of the Taliban regimes security arrangements that seek to provide security for the few remaining foreign embassies in Kabul. There were also cross-border rocket attacks on Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.

In the morning hours of March 9, in the countrys fourth largest city, Mazar-i-Sharif, a suicide bomber blew himself up in the office of Mohammad Dawood Muzammil, the Taliban governor of Afghanistans Balkh province. The ISKP claimed responsibility for the assassination of one of the highest-ranking figures in the Taliban administration. Muzammil, in his capacity as the governor of Nangarhar, led the fight against ISKP and was transferred to Balkh in late 2022.

Prior to this, ISKP killed Abdul Haq Abu Omar, the Taliban police commander for Badakhshan province and a Taliban judge in Jalalabad. These killings introduced the conflict between the Taliban and the ISKP into a completely new phase. Since coming to power, the Talibans response to the jihadist threat has ranged from denying the ISKPs presence on Afghan soil to portraying the group as insignificant. The Taliban regime refused any outside help to solve this problem.

Almost every ISKP attack is always followed by a Taliban counter-attack on ISKP hideouts in Kabul and elsewhere during which the alleged perpetrators of the attacks are liquidated. For example the killing of Qari Fateh, the alleged ISKP intelligence chief, during a Taliban raid in Kabul in February this year, was highlighted as a successful retaliation for attacks on Russian, Pakistani and Chinese diplomatic missions.

At the beginning of January, eight ISKP members were killed in Kabul and Nimroz province. A government spokesman claimed that those responsible for the attacks on a hotel in Kabul, the Pakistani embassy, and the airport in the capital were liquidated. In any case, the Islamic State of Khorosan represents an existential threat to the government in Kabul and represents a wider global problem that should concern foreign diplomats and intelligence officers.

Relations in the region directly affect the development of events in Afghanistan, which has no access to the sea or any special natural barriers on its borders, and therefore throughout its history it has been constantly subject to interventions by its neighbors and superpowers.

Events in Afghanistan also have consequences for neighboring countries. Pakistan is the most important neighboring country that supported the Taliban regime in the 1990s and their subsequent guerrilla struggle. Many analysts (at least initially) saw the Taliban takeover as a triumph of Pakistans regional politics. Senior Pakistani officials held numerous meetings with the new Taliban government, both in Kabul and Islamabad.

However, according to some developments, it seems that the Talibans return to power could pose a challenge to Pakistan. The victory of the Taliban provides an injection of moral support, and perhaps a material boost, to Pakistani Islamist terrorist groups, including the so-called Pakistani Taliban TTP.

TTP attacks on Pakistani security forces increased after August 2021 and reportedly prompted the Pakistani government to seek mediation from the Afghan Taliban. The TTP continued to attack Pakistani targets, including an attack in January 2023 that attacked police officers and killed more than 100 people. Relations between Afghanistan and Pakistan are further complicated by the presence of over one million Afghan refugees in Pakistan, as well as a long-running and ethnically colored dispute over their 2,500 km interstate border. Afghan and Pakistani border forces have occasionally clashed on it during the past year.

Iran, with which Afghanistan shares a western border, opposed Taliban rule in the 1990s but has now maintained diplomatic relations, emphasizing the need to represent in power Afghan ethnic and religious groups with which Iran has close ties. More precisely, it is about the Tajiks who speak a variant of Persian and the Khazars who are mostly Shiites. There are still disputes over water sources and refugees with occasional border clashes.

Neighbors in Central Asia (Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan) reacted in different ways to the Taliban in power. The governments of Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan appear to prioritize economic ties, including the planned Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) gas pipeline, and have held official meetings with the Taliban. Tajikistan, on the other hand, opposed the Taliban and offered sanctuary to the anti-Taliban NRF. This is a consequence of the Tajik authorities struggle with Islamist militants, as well as ties with Afghan Tajiks (the countrys second largest ethnic group), some of whom are opposed to Taliban rule.

Relations with China are a separate story. China, which played a relatively limited role in Afghanistan under the former government, made some economic investments in Afghanistan (particularly in the development of minerals and other resources) before taking over from the Taliban, but large projects did not materialize due to instability, lack of infrastructure and other constraints. Despite concerns about Islamist terrorist groups based in Afghanistan because of its problem with the Muslim population in Xinjiang, Beijing has tacitly accepted Taliban rule. During a visit to Kabul in May 2022, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi emphasized that China respects the independent elections of the Afghan people.

The question of all questions is how to help the Afghan people and not the regime? The US has provided over $1.1 billion in humanitarian aid since the Taliban took over. Such aid differs greatly from the previous aid amounting to over $5 billion annually between 2019 and 2021 (in addition to helping the people, the funds were used to pay the salaries of civil and military officials and made up a large part of the national GDP).

The two elements of US policy that have the greatest impact on the humanitarian situation are sanctions and monitoring of the reserves of the Central Bank of Afghanistan (DAB). US sanctions against the Taliban (in force in various forms since 1999) remain, but it is unclear to what extent they are affecting humanitarian conditions in Afghanistan. Since the Taliban took power, the US Treasury Department has issued several statements saying US sanctions against the Taliban do not prohibit aid and has authorized some humanitarian payments.

The US government froze the assets of US-based DAB days after the Taliban entered Kabul. Taliban and some foreign leaders have called on the US to unfreeze these assets, which total about 7 billion dollars. In September 2022, the US government announced the establishment of the Afghanistan Fund (based in Switzerland) to pay $3.5 billion in aid to the Afghan economy. At the time of writing in March, no payouts have yet been made. The other half of the funds ($3.5 billion) is also held by the US government, but it is assumed that it will be transferred to a fund account in Switzerland after a federal court in New York recently ruled that the victims of the 9/11 terrorist attack are not entitled to this money as compensation for attack.

A good aid plan was presented by the UN in 2022 under the name Transitional Engagement Framework. The plan is based on providing basic services to the people, including deliveries of basic necessities and medical assistance. The plan calls for the UN to establish a minimally functional relationship with the Taliban. In short, the plan proposed by the UN involves unprecedented financial, political and human risks, as well as creating new potential for corruption. The Taliban already have experience in trying to use humanitarian aid to strengthen their rule. At the beginning of this year, the UN approved a humanitarian aid appeal worth $4.6 billion, and time will tell the results: how much donors will donate and what the effects will be.

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Afghanistan: The Glory And Misery Of The Taliban Regime Analysis - Eurasia Review

Afghanistan Taliban fume over US violation of airspace. Representational Image/AFP.

Kabul: Afghanistan Taliban leaders have criticised and expressed anger over the United States for violating the airspace and said it was difficult for their government to defend the airspace of Afghanistan.

An Afghanistan military expert Asadullah Nadim said, the planes and drones that fly in the airspace of Afghanistan are from some advanced countries and it is difficult for the Taliban government to defend it.

The chief of staff of the Islamic Emirate, Qari Fasihuddin Fitrat, in a interview with RTA said: Even though it was a term in the agreement, it has been violated many times, and even though the US side has been informed, it is violated many times.

Efforts made to make Afghanistan forces more professional

Fitrat said that the Afghanistan Taliban government has decided to increase the size of the army from 150,000 to 200,000.

We have decided to increase the size of the army, God willing, in the following year, from 150,000 to 170,000 and gradually increase the number of troops to 200,000, he said.

Another military expert, Sarwar Niazi said, Afghanistan should at least have an army in proportion to its neighbors and in proportion to its population. An army that has an air force, artillery, ground troops, and air defense forces, he added.

Over the past two decades, military training in Afghanistan was one of the most costly sectors. The 350,000-member force of the previous government was disbanded after the collapse of that government.

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Updated Date: March 31, 2023 12:51:29 IST

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In early March, Afghanistans foreign minister, Mawlavi Amir Khan Muttaqi, met with Kazakh Ambassador to Afghanistan Alimkhan Yessengeldiyev and agreed to expand bilateral cooperation in the transport sector. High on the agenda was developing the railway system in Afghanistan. Muttaqi requested technical support from Kazakhstan for new rail line construction.

Kazakhstan has expressed interest in participating in the reconstruction and development of Afghanistans infrastructure, especially in the areas of transport, energy, and agriculture. This comes amid efforts to reconnect Afghanistan to world trade and Kazakhstans attempts to become a mediator in the region. An informal meeting between Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev and Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev was held prior to the Muttaqi-Yessengeldiyev agreement, and Afghanistan was central to their discussion.

Afghanistan is the third largest buyer of Kazakh grain. The Afghan market traditionally occupies a significant share in the export of grain and flour from Kazakhstan. In 2022 Kazakhstan exported 1.36 million tonnes of wheat flour to Afghanistan, 52 percent more than in 2021, according to APK-Inform, a Central Asian agricultural analytical site.

In 2018 a rail route from Kazakhstan to Afghanistan was opened for traffic. The Kostanay-Bolashak-Serhetabad (Turkmenistan) rail route is more than 3,500 kilometers long. It traverses through the Kazakh city of Bolashak and the Turkmen city of Serhetabad, where it crosses the border with Afghanistan to Herat.

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In 2022 plans were discussed between Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan for the construction of a grain terminal and elevator at the Turkmen-Afghan border. This grain supply route via Turkmenistan is being promoted by Kazakhstan because it bypasses Uzbekistan, which according to KazAgro, the national grain operator, has traditionally imposed high rates for the transit of grain through Uzbekistan to Afghanistan. However, no Kazakh railroads have been laid yet in Afghanistan. Uzbekistan has been the only country so far that has built and managed a railway line in Afghanistan.

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Advancing this cross-border transport development is necessary to prevent a humanitarian crisis and economic collapse in Afghanistan. Indeed the Afghan issue has created a tricky new reality for Kazakhstan and the region as a whole. Central Asian governments see Afghanistan as both a threat and an opportunity.

Underpinning this perception is Afghanistans position at the heart of the region. This has resulted in concerted efforts by countries to align their policy in engaging with Afghanistan.

With Russias war in Ukraine and Western sanctions on Russia, as well as the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, Central Asia has been forced to make its own contingency plans when it comes to security and trade. In light of this, Kazakhstan and the other Central Asia republics have pursued a strategy with Afghanistan based on the assumption that cooperation and engagement would promote stability. One way they have been going about this is by opening up and testing transport corridors through the country. An example of this is the Uzbek-led Trans-Afghan railway project.

For Kazakhstan, supporting economic development along the north-south axis would see Afghanistan becoming a bridge, not a barrier. In this vision, Kazakhstan hopes to be the convener, facilitator, and engine for change by prying open physical and diplomatic bottlenecks.

The benefits attained through cooperation between Afghanistan and Kazakhstan are obvious for all to see. There is a mutual interest on both sides for cooperation, as the Taliban cannot afford long-term isolation. Economic gains from expanded trade and investment would help diversify Kazakhstans transport corridors and bolster Afghanistans integration efforts with the wider regional and international community.

That said, Kazakh interests in Afghanistan are challenged by the extreme domestic fragility of the country and the risk of sanctions. Security has remained a key concern in the region, and despite Taliban assurances terrorist activity remains high and widespread.

This has been a key issue for Kazakhstan and has been reflected in Kazakhstans efforts to request external support on the Afghan issue. Through the Moscow-led Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), Kazakhstan has been airing its concerns over the unstable situation in Afghanistan and has suggested that the CSTO should increase its focus on securing Central Asias southern borders. Other Central Asian countries have expressed the same concern, and the Afghan issue has brought them together. However, fault lines have emerged, with Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan both vying for the mediator role of the region and adopting their own way of working with the Taliban.

With pressure from sanctions, any type of economic interaction with the Taliban government poses a reputational risk to Kazakhstans relations with the West. Given the size of Western involvement in Kazakhstan, particularly in its oil and gas sector, this is something that would need to be considered by the Kazakh government.

All that said, transport development is seen as key to both Kazakhstan and Afghanistans economic future. Security will continue to be a challenge but without cooperation between Kazakhstan and Afghanistan, the prospects for stability in Central Asia are fairly slim. The spillover effect that could result from an isolated and vulnerable Afghanistan is a risk that Kazakhstan would want to avoid given the January 2022 protests. Kazakhstan must play a key role in restoring trade and communications, and in transforming Afghanistan into a route for licit rather than illicit trade between Central Asia and South Asia.

Much remains to be done, however, and Kazakhstan as well as the other Central Asian states will continue to act in and around Afghanistan, pursuing their national interests as they see them. Looking ahead, Kazakhstan should pursue its desire for cooperation with eyes wide open to make certain that in the process of seeking peace and economic benefit, they do not achieve just the opposite.

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Kazakhstan and Afghanistan Seek to Realign Bilateral Ties - The Diplomat