A Taliban commander and senior leader of the Haqqani Network militant group, Anas Haqqani, met for talks with former Afghan President Hamid Karzai, a Taliban official told Reuters on Wednesday. Karzai was accompanied by Abdullah Abdullah, the head of the Afghan National Reconciliation Council.
Daily Archives: 18. August 2021
Afghanistan’s president Ashraf Ghani revealed to be in United Arab Emirates after fleeing ‘with helicopter full of cash’
A spokesman for the Russian embassy in Kabul, Nikita Ishchenko, was quoted as saying: “The collapse of the regime…is most eloquently characterised by how Ghani escaped from Afghanistan: four cars were filled with money, they tried to shove another part of the money into a helicopter, but not everything fit.
Asked by the Associated Press about how he knew the details of Ghani’s departure, Mr Ishchenko said “well, we are working here,” without offering any more details.
Ulrich Teusch: „Ich mache mir Sorgen um den demokratischen Rechtsstaat“
Politische Angst: Das ist es, was der Journalist und Autor Ulrich Teusch zum ersten Mal in seinem Leben während der Corona-Krise verspürt hat. Und das hat seinen Grund: „Es geht in diesem Land vielfach nicht mehr mit rechtsstaatlichen Dingen zu. Wir erleben eine Krise der Verfassung, des Rechtsstaats, der Rechtsprechung, der Rechtssicherheit“, sagt Teusch im Interview mit den NachDenkSeiten.
So much for ‚Taliban 2.0‘: Fighters shoot dead journalist as he raises Afghan flag in defiance at Jalalabad protest as Kabul ‚car thief‘ is tarred and locals claim woman was shot dead for not wearing a burqa in rural province
A journalist who raised the Afghan national flag in defiance at a protest in the northern city of Jalalabad on Wednesday was shot dead by the jihadists, according to local reports. Zahidullah Nazirzada had joined defiant crowds in raising the tricolour, now outlawed and replaced by the Taliban‘s white banner.
Footage from Kabul showed a car thief on Tuesday with his face covered in tar, strapped up to the back of a truck and his hands tied behind his back as people gathered around to gawp. A traffic cop stood nearby apparently powerless.
A young woman was shot dead for allegedly refusing to wear a burqa by marauding jihadists when they captured the northern town of Taloqan in Takhar province last week, according to a post widely shared on social media.
Evakuierung in Afghanistan: Kabinett billigt Bundeswehreinsatz in Kabul
Das Kabinett hat das Mandat für den Evakuierungseinsatz der Bundeswehr auf den Weg gebracht – der Bundestag soll kommende Woche abstimmen.
First Dutch evacuated on rescue flights from Kabul
On Tuesday, Kaag told NOS broadcaster that although a Dutch military plane was able to land, the short turnaround time at the airport controlled by American troops meant that they were unable to board. ‘There was a half-hour slot to get people on the tarmac,’ she said. ‘Lots of people were there, and at the airport gates, with their families. I think it is awful.’ She had called for the 6,000 American troops, who have been sent back into Afghanistan after their withdrawal, to allow people more time for boarding.
Afghanistan ++ Niederländer verpassen Evakuierungsflug ++
Erneut chaotische Szenen am Flughafen Kabul: Mehrere niederländische Staatsangehörige wurden auf dem Weg zu ihrem Evakuierungsflug vom US-Militär aufgehalten. Hunderte Menschen harren weiter rund um den Airport Kabul aus.
A great way for Senate Democrats who are very mad about Afghanistan to stick it to Joe Biden would be for them to repeal the 2001 AUMF!
Senators worry time running out on updating 2001 military authorization
(03.08.2021)
Should lawmakers try to force the issue of updating the 2001 AUMF by establishing an expiration date, one of their best chances would be via an amendment to the must-pass fiscal 2022 defense policy bill that both chambers will take up this fall.
Adios AUMF? Democrats press Biden for help in revoking old war powers
(21.01.2021)
In a letter Thursday to Biden, five House Democrats called on the new president to quickly work with Congress to kill the 2002 authorization for the Iraq War and hone the 2001 powers for the war on terrorism. The letter — signed by chairs of the House Foreign Affairs, Intelligence and Rules committees — says any replacement authority must name mission objectives, adversaries and targeted countries, as well as include a sunset clause to ensure Congress regularly revisits the war powers debate.
“Congress has been missing in action, and President Joe Biden knows that,” said Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.), who is spearheading the effort, in an interview.
U.S.-Kongress: Kriegsvollmacht vom 14. September 2001 wackelt
(17. Mai 2013)
Barbara Lee. Allein für alle, allen voraus.
Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) faced death threats, insults and hate mail after she voted against a broad authorization used to carry out the war in Afghanistan. The House vote was 240 to 1. The Senate vote was 98 to 0.
Clip of Barbara Lee, Congress member to oppose Afghanistan war in 2001, goes viral as Taliban retakes country
In the days after the 9/11 attacks in 2001, just one member of Congress voted against giving President Bush authority to go to war in Afghanistan.
Barbara Lee, a Democratic representative from California, warned at the time that approving the so-called Authorisation for the Use of Military Force (AUMF) could mean the US would be embarking “on an open-ended war with neither an exit strategy nor a focused target.”
VFP Statement on U.S. Withdrawal from Afghanistan
Veterans For Peace has previously condemned the U.S. „forever wars“ against „terror“ and called for withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan, Iraq and other places in the world. We unequivocally believe that war is not the answer to any problem and that there is no military solution in Afghanistan.
The U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan was shameful and poorly executed. We have left too many behind. It was only after veteran and media outcry over leaving dedicated translators and their families, people who risked their lives for us that the U.S. decided, too late, to include them in our withdrawal. Many Afghans have been blocked by callus immigration policy and „Muslim Bans“ from seeking safety in the United States, from the destabilization in Afghanistan that the U.S. created. Caring for refugees and civilians fleeing from conflict is basic decency, and the United States fails to act with the urgency required to protect people. Casual disregard for Afghan lives continues on all levels.
Biden Was Right
The ineffectiveness and collapse of Afghanistan’s military and governing institutions largely substantiates Biden’s skepticism that US-led efforts to prop up the government in Kabul would ever enable it to stand on its own feet. The international community has spent nearly 20 years, many thousands of lives, and trillions of dollars to do good by Afghanistan – taking down al-Qaeda; beating back the Taliban; supporting, advising, training, and equipping the Afghan military; bolstering governing institutions; and investing in the country’s civil society.
Humiliating as it may be, leaving Afghanistan is still the right decision
Biden deserves credit for facing the facts and doing the right thing. His recent predecessors either were dissuaded from taking the same step by egregiously wrong military and foreign policy advice or else blanched at being labeled the president who lost a war. Biden will take the hit, but the simple truth is that we have not so much abandoned Afghanistan as Afghanistan has abandoned us, or more precisely, never joined us in the first place.
The U.S. Government Lied For Two Decades About Afghanistan
That is particularly true given how heavily the U.S. had Afghanistan under every conceivable kind of electronic surveillance for more than a decade. A significant portion of the archive provided to me by Edward Snowden detailed the extensive surveillance the NSA had imposed on all of Afghanistan. In accordance with the guidelines he required, we never published most of those documents about U.S. surveillance in Afghanistan on the ground that it could endanger people without adding to the public interest, but some of the reporting gave a glimpse into just how comprehensively monitored the country was by U.S. security services.
Hurrah! Washington’s Pointless Sojourn in the Graveyard of Empires Is Finally Over
Then there was also the US intelligence agencies, which must have been channeling Hemingway’s very words. Just 4 days ago they estimated that Kabul could fall in 90 days and then suddenly revised the figure to 72 hours.
But nothing could top the blinky Washington careerist who now sits in the big chair at Foggy Bottom:
“If there is a significant deterioration in security … I don’t think it’s going to be something that happens from a Friday to a Monday.”
– Anthony Blinken, US secretary of state.
Alas, it surely did. And now the same medieval brutes who were originally recruited and trained by the CIA in the 1980s and who ruled Afghanistan with a bloody reign of terror from 1996-2001, in fact, were in the president’s office within hours of Ghani’s flight. Except during the interim, the Grim Reaper of War had racked-up a horrendous butchers bill …
US nearing deal with Qatar to house thousands of Afghans who helped military, as situation worsens in Afghanistan
(14.08.2021)
The Biden administration has been considering using third countries to process the Afghan Special Immigrant Visa applicants, and on Thursday the Pentagon announced it would send around 1,000 troops to Qatar in the coming days to facilitate the processing. Secretary of State Antony Blinken also spoke with his Qatari counterpart on Thursday and the State Department said he thanked Qatar for supporting „U.S. efforts to provide safety and security to Afghan nationals.“
Top Taliban leader leaves Qatar for Afghanistan
(17.08.2021)
A top Taliban official has met with a Qatari official before leaving the country for Afghanistan.
Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar met with Qatar‘s Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani on Tuesday.
Transcript of Taliban’s first news conference in Kabul
“We have expelled the foreigners and I would like to congratulate the whole nation on this.
This is pride, not only for a limited number of people. This is a proud moment for the whole nation. This kind of pride is rare when it can be achieved. The whole nation, after the whole history of the nation and therefore, on the base of this I would like to congratulate the whole nation and I would like to welcome you.
Freedom and independence seeking is a legitimate right of every nation. The Afghans also use their legitimate right after 20 years of struggle for freedom and for emancipating the country from occupation, this was our right and we achieved this right.“
Machtübernahme in Afghanistan: Taliban verkünden Kriegsende und Amnestie
Frauen sollen arbeiten, sie seien Teil der Gesellschaft. Man werde allen verzeihen, „die gegen uns waren“, so die Taliban bei ihrem ersten offiziellen Auftritt. An den versöhnlichen Worten haben viele Menschen in Afghanistan Zweifel.