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ARAB AND WORLD

Wed 15 Mar 2023 8:57 pm - Jerusalem Time

A year since the return of the Taliban to power in Afghanistan

Paris, 8-10- (AFP) - In the following are the most prominent stations since the return of the Taliban to power in Afghanistan a year ago, with the accompanying decline in human rights, especially women's rights, economic collapse and attacks:

On August 15, the Taliban occupied the presidential palace in Kabul without encountering resistance, after a lightning attack it launched in May, taking advantage of the start of the withdrawal of US and NATO forces.
President Ashraf Ghani, who had left the country, admitted that "the Taliban had won" and explained that he had fled his country to avoid "bloodshed".
Washington froze about 9.5 billion dollars belonging to the Central Bank of Afghanistan, while the World Bank suspended its aid to this country, whose 60 percent of its population depends on international assistance.

The collapse of the Afghan army and government has accelerated the withdrawal of the US military and their civilian Afghan allies. These operations witnessed, on August 26, an attack claimed by ISIS at Kabul Airport, which killed more than 100 people.
On August 30, the US military left Afghanistan permanently, ending a two-decade presence in the country.

On September 7 and 8, the Taliban announced the appointment of the most prominent ministers in its government, all of them from its ranks, headed by Muhammad Hassan Akhund, who was previously close to its founder, Mullah Omar.
Western countries criticized this government, saying that it "does not represent" the ethnic and religious diversity in the country, contrary to what the new regime promised. It made respect for human rights, especially women's rights, a precondition in negotiations over aid and recognition of the new Islamic regime.

The Taliban movement, despite its promises that its regime would be more lenient than its first period of rule between 1996 and 2001, imposed severe restrictions on women.
On March 23, 2022, the Taliban announced the closure of complementary and secondary schools for girls, just hours after they reopened.
In early May, the Taliban's supreme commander ordered women to fully cover their faces in public, with preference given to wearing the burqa.
Women were denied many jobs in the public sector and prevented from traveling without a male relative outside their cities.

On May 17, the Taliban regime announced the dissolution of the Human Rights Commission, a body that specifically monitors violence against the population. The Electoral Commission and the Higher National Council for Reconciliation had the same fate.
There have been successive decisions imposing restrictions such as banning non-religious music, banning human faces in advertisements, and banning the broadcast of films or series showing unveiled women. The movement required men to wear traditional dress and grow beards.

Deprived of the international aid that was vital to the country, Afghanistan has plunged into an acute financial and humanitarian crisis with skyrocketing unemployment. According to the United Nations, more than half of the country's population, about 24 million Afghans, are threatened by food insecurity.
On March 31, the United Nations made the largest appeal to the international community for funds for a single country. However, the initiative only allowed the collection of 2.44 billion dollars, while the required 4.4 billion.
Negotiations took place between Washington and the Taliban about releasing the seized funds after an earthquake that killed more than a thousand people and displaced thousands at the end of June in the east of the country.

In October 2021, an attack on Shiites who have long been persecuted in this Sunni-majority country resulted in 60 dead, the deadliest attack since the withdrawal of US forces.
The Islamic State Khorasan Province, with which the Taliban have clashed for years, claimed responsibility for the attack.
In the spring of 2022, dozens of people were killed in a series of bombings, most of which were claimed by the Islamic State’s Khorasan Province.
The Taliban asserts that it has defeated the Islamic State in Afghanistan, but analysts believe that the extremist group still poses the main security challenge to the new Afghan authority.

On the evening of August 1, US President Joe Biden announced that the United States had killed by a drone the leader of Al-Qaeda, Ayman Al-Zawahiri, in Kabul. Al-Zawahiri was among the most wanted by the American intelligence services for years.
Al-Zawahiri, who succeeded Osama bin Laden in the leadership of Al-Qaeda, was one of the masterminds of the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States, which resulted in nearly three thousand deaths.
The Taliban condemned the attack, but did not confirm the killing of Al-Zawahiri or his coming to and presence in Kabul.

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A year since the return of the Taliban to power in Afghanistan

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