The Washington Post reported on 16 April , that the Afghan government believe they have Lashkar Gah and Gereshk under control, and have expanded security as far south as Garmser district center and as far west as Marjah district center, but most of those two districts and many others remain under Taliban influence or control. In January , the US government sent a directive to the Pentagon which granted new legal authority for the U. For 3 weeks in that month, the U. American commanders in Afghanistan said they believed that between 90 and Islamic State militants had been killed in these recent operations.
Ground forces led by the Afghan army and backed by police and paramilitary groups pushed into Achin district, the group's main base and Dislodged Islamic State From their Stronghold, U. The operation was aided by local civilians who set up checkpoints to help maintain security in their villages and later supplemented the Afghan forces. In early April , it was reported that US and Afghan forces had killed 1, suspected militants, others wounded and detained between April and March , ISIS militants have also been trying to flee into Ghazni and Nuristan province , whilst a rise in defections from the group to the government and the Taliban.
In late June , IS militants attacked police checkpoints in the Kot area of Nangarhar province, heavy fighting between Islamic State militants and government security forces has claimed dozens of lives in eastern Afghanistan, as many as 36 IS militants are reported to have been killed in the assaults, at least a dozen Afghan security forces and civilians have been killed, with another 18 wounded. The latest attacks indicate the group remains a potent threat to a government already battling an insurgency dominated by the rival Taliban.
Afghan forces have been battling the Taliban in northeastern Kunduz as part of the Afghan forces' own spring offensive. The Taliban executed at least 10 people , some of whom were reportedly off-duty soldiers from the Afghan army on 31 May after kidnapping up to people from buses and cars at a checkpoint on the Kunduz-Takhar highway.
The majority of the passengers were released after they were interrogated by the Taliban insurgents, however at least 18 individuals still remained hostage. On 1 June , Taliban insurgents stormed a court in the Afghan city of Ghazni , clashing with police for at least an hour in an attack in which 10 people, including all five of the militants, were killed, police said. The attack came days after the Taliban, vowed to seek revenge for the execution last month of six Taliban prisoners by the Afghan government.
In June , President Obama approved a policy to give the U.
The former child bride who is using her story to liberate Afghan women
The US commander in Afghanistan, General John Nicholson, will now be able to decide when it is appropriate for American troops to accompany conventional Afghan forces into the field; something they have so far only been allowed to do with Afghan special forces. A senior US defence official said that the expanded powers are only meant to be employed "in those select instances in which their engagement can enable strategic effects on the battlefield".
Previous US rules of engagement in Afghanistan impose limits on US forces ability to strike at insurgents; being allowed to take action against the Taliban in moments when their assistance was needed to prevent a significant Afghan military setback. The Taliban still have a large presence in the region with as many as 25, fighters with more than 30, Afghan security forces fighting to quell the group's resurgence.
UK troops had been due to leave Afghanistan this year but will now have their mission extended into The incident comes 10 days after an attack on a bus carrying Nepali security guards working for the Canadian embassy in Kabul that killed 14 people. Nicholson, stated that Afghan official armed forces' casualties had risen 20 percent compared to The operation was backed by U. On 26 July, in overnight raid in Kot district during the operation, supported by foreign air support, one of the most important leaders of IS in the region, Saad Emarati, one of the founders of the ISIL-KP, was killed along with other suspected militants killed; by 30 July killed hundreds of IS militants in eastern Afghanistan.
Afghan troops pushed into Kot district after a heavy air and artillery bombardment that forced Daesh to flee into nearby mountain areas, Afghan forces met little resistance, finding an already destroyed training camp, by 30 July, the provincial governor said that 78 Daesh fighters had been killed in the operation. The operation reclaimed large and significant parts of eastern Afghanistan, forcing Daesh militants back into the mountains of southern Nangarhar. Afghan intelligence officials said four dead Iranian Commandos were discovered, village elders told Afghan provincial officials that many Taliban dead and wounded were taken back across the Iranian border, where the insurgents had been recruited and trained.
As of December , there are 9, US service members in Afghanistan, Nicholson told reporters at the Pentagon that the number of US forces would be reduced to 8, by ; the US and its 39 coalition partners in Afghanistan are committed to providing support to Afghanistan for through , in particular, Nicholson added that the international community had pledged millions of dollars and advisory support to Afghanistan — these commitments would help grow the size of the Afghan Special Forces. On 22 September , the Afghan government signed a draft peace deal with Hezb-i-Islami.
According to the draft agreement, Hezb-i-Islami agreed to cease hostilities, cut ties to extremist groups and respect the Afghan Constitution, in exchange for government recognition of the group and support for the removal of United Nations and American sanctions against Hekmatyar, who was also promised an honorary post in the government. In early January , the Marine Corps Times reported that Afghan forces seek to rebuild, following an exhausting fighting season; 33 districts, which are spread across 16 Afghan provinces, are under insurgent control whilst are under government control and nearly districts remain "contested".
On 9 February , General John W. He also asserted that Russia was trying to "legitimize" the Taliban by creating the "false narrative" that the militant organization has been fighting the Islamic State and that Afghan forces have not, he asserted Russia's goal, was "to undermine the United States and NATO" in Afghanistan. However he said that the area in which Islamic State fighters operate in Afghanistan had been greatly reduced. Special Forces soldier was severely wounded that day when the base he was at was attacked in Helmand province, raising the number of U.
The airstrike marked a renewed strategy by U. The Obama administration strategy had focused much of its efforts in pushing reconciliation between the Taliban and the central government of Afghanistan; although in June , to turn back the tide of Taliban gains, President Obama changed the rules of engagement to give U. State Department-while attempting to draw down U. Since the beginning of , airstrikes against terrorists with drone strikes alone killing more than IS militants ; he added that the affiliate has an estimated fighters in two eastern Afghan provinces. On 21 April , Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan fighters along with Afghan security forces allied to them stormed th Corps military base near Mazar-e-Sharif, killing over Afghan soldiers.
On 28 April , the Washington Post reported that the Taliban announced the beginning of their spring offensive dubbed "Operation Mansouri. During the same day they had overran a border outpost in southern Shorabak district , killing 15 soldiers, in addition to another outpost in district of Khakrez , killing 8 more.
The next day rebels assaulted another military base in Shah Wali Kot and an outpost, killing 4 soldiers and injuring 4 more, while pro-government forces abandoned a village in northern district of Maruf. On 24 May Taliban assaulted a base in Maiwand district killing 13 soldiers. On 31 May , the German embassy in Kabul was attacked by a suicide truck, located in the heavily fortified area of Kabul, killing over 90 and injuring over The bomb went off at about On 23 August , the Taliban captured the district of Zana Khan in Ghazni Province after a series of clashes with Afghan security forces.
The Guardian reported that following the announcement of Donald Trump new strategy in the country, More than munitions were released in August and September, bringing the total number of munitions used in to nearly 3,, more than twice the expended munitions in President Ashraf Ghani strongly endorsed the new campaign of U. Nicholson estimated that there are approximately to such facilities in Afghanistan and that "these operations will continue on in the coming days.
Pence also stated that the USA was making great progress with the war in Afghanistan. According to The Washington Post , this contradicts the official US Government list which only has 13 such organizations. The Guardian reported that Afghan government officials praised the new strategy, not only for increasing troop numbers and removing with strict timelines, but for increasing pressure on Pakistan-which they see as a main sponsor of the insurgency.
In a televised address, President Trump said a new approach to Pakistan would be a "pillar" of the new strategy, adding that "we can no longer be silent about Pakistan's safe havens for terrorist organisations, the Taliban and other groups that pose a threat to the region and beyond;" Najibullah Azad, a spokesman for the Afghan president, said that "the strategy is made in accordance with realities on the ground", and that "this is the first time the US government is coming with a very clear-cut message to Pakistan to either stop what you're doing or face the negative consequences.
On 15 September , the New York Times reported that the CIA was looking to reportedly seeking authority to conduct its own drone strikes in Afghanistan and other war zones, according to current and former intelligence and military officials, the change in authority was being considered by the White House as part of the new strategy, despite concerns by the Pentagon.
They will add to the approximately 11, US troops already serving in Afghanistan, bringing the total to at least 14, US troops stationed in Afghanistan.
Following attacks by the Taliban and Islamic State that killed scores of civilians, President Trump and Afghan officials decided to rule out any talks with the Taliban. On 15 February , The New York Times reported the rise of Afghan civilians being intentionally targeted by the Taliban, based on an annual United Nations report released a week earlier. This report offered a detailed assessment of the 16 year Afghan war, showing the rise of complex bombing attacks deliberately targeting civilians in , having 10, Afghan civilians wounded or killed. The report emphasizes the rise of "complex attacks", a type of suicide assault that is becoming more deadly, described by the New York Times as the hallmark of the war in These attacks are referred to as the Taliban's ferocious response to US President Trump's new strategy of war an increased pace of aerial bombardments targeting Taliban and Islamic State Militants , giving the message that the Taliban can strike at will, even in the capital city, Kabul.
S and its allies for fighting war in Afghanistan, and it denied targeting civilians. The New York Times quoted Atiqullah Amarkhel, a retired general and military analyst based in Kabul, saying that the UN report proved the failure of peace talks, as the Taliban and the US government are both determined for victory rather than negotiating settlement.
He said "More airstrikes mean more suicide attacks," proving the intensification of the war by In September , the United Nations raised concerns over the increasing number of civilian casualties due to air strikes in Afghanistan. In a statement issued by the UNAMA , it reminded all the parties involved in the conflict "to uphold their obligations to protect civilians from harm. On 17 October , days before parliamentary election , Abdul Jabar Qahraman, an election candidate was killed in an attack by Taliban. The Taliban issued a statement, warning teachers and students to not participate in the upcoming elections or use schools as polling centers.
On 17 December , U. The Taliban gave conditions of a pullout date for U. The meeting was described by U. According to the Watson Institute for International Studies Costs of War Project, roughly 31, civilians had been killed as a result of the war up to the middle of In , according to the United Nations UN annual report there were 3, civilian deaths and 7, people wounded. The pro-government forces caused 17 percent of civilian deaths and injuries — including United States and NATO troops, which were responsible for about 2 percent of the casualties.
In , a total of 3, civilians deaths and 7, injuries were recorded by the United Nations. While, the Afghan air force accounted for at least 85 deaths and injuries. The UN was not able to attribute responsibility for the remaining 38 deaths and 65 injuries resulting from air strikes. During the parliamentary elections on 20 October , several explosions targeting the polling stations took place.
At least 36 people were killed and were injured. Previously, ten election candidates were killed during the campaigning by the Taliban and the Islamic State group. According to Nicholas Kristoff , improved healthcare resulting from the war has saved hundreds of thousands of lives.
Since , more than 5. Afghans who interpreted for the British army have been tortured and killed in Afghanistan, including their families. Taxes on opium exports became one of the mainstays of Taliban income. According to Rashid, "drug money funded the weapons, ammunition and fuel for the war.
He added that the Taliban had come to increasingly rely on three sources of money: The trafficking of accumulated stocks continued in and In , the UN mentioned the "existence of significant stocks of opiated accumulated during previous years of bumper harvests". In September — before 11 September attacks against the U. Soon after the invasion opium production increased markedly. As of , the Afghan government has cooperated with Taliban forces to provide education services: As of , 8. While the Taliban have typically opposed girls' education, in in Khogyani District it has allowed girls to receive education in order to improve its standing among local residents.
War crimes a serious violation of the laws and customs of war giving rise to individual criminal responsibility [] have been committed by both sides including civilian massacres, bombings of civilian targets, terrorism, use of torture and the murder of prisoners of war. Additional common crimes include theft, arson, and the destruction of property not warranted by military necessity.
In , Amnesty International reported that the Taliban committed mass murder and gang rape of Afghan civilians in Kunduz. When the Taliban asserted their control over Kunduz, they claimed to be bringing law and order and Shari'a to the city. But everything they've done has violated both.
I don't know who can rescue us from this situation. The Convoy of Death investigated these allegations and claimed that mass graves of thousands of victims were found by UN investigators [] and that the U.
Afghanistan, domestic violence and divorce: one woman's harrowing story
Passaro was found guilty of one count of felony assault with a dangerous weapon and three counts of misdemeanor assault. On 10 August , he was sentenced to 8 years and 4 months in prison. In , two unarmed civilian Afghan prisoners were tortured and later killed by U. Fifteen soldiers were charged. During the summer of , ISAF charged five United States Army soldiers with the murder of three Afghan civilians in Kandahar province and collecting their body parts as trophies in what came to be known as the Maywand District murders.
In addition, seven soldiers were charged with crimes such as hashish use, impeding an investigation and attacking the whistleblower , Specialist Justin Stoner. A British Royal Marine Sergeant, identified as Sergeant Alexander Blackman from Taunton, Somerset, [] was convicted at court martial in Wiltshire of the murder of an unarmed, reportedly wounded, Afghan fighter in Helmand Province in September In , after appeal to the Court Martial Appeal Court CMAC , his conviction was lessened to manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility and the sentence was reduced to seven years effectively releasing Blackman due to time served.
On 11 March , the Kandahar massacre occurred when sixteen civilians were killed and six wounded in the Panjwayi District of Kandahar Province , Afghanistan.
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After pleading guilty to sixteen counts of premeditated murder, Bales was sentenced to life in prison without parole and dishonorably discharged from the United States Army. Doctors Without Borders officials said: In November , Amnesty International accused the Pentagon of covering up evidence related to war crimes , torture and unlawful killings in Afghanistan. In September , the United States threatened to arrest and impose sanctions on International Criminal Court judges and other officials if they tried to charge any U.
November 30, , the BBC, citing the U. The cost of the war reportedly was a major factor as U. In the summer of , preparing for withdrawal the following year, the U. Some was sold to Afghans as scrap metal. In a interview, the then-head U. Central Command General David H. Petraeus , insisted that the Taliban were gaining strength. He cited a recent increase in attacks in Afghanistan and in neighboring Pakistan. Petraeus insisted that the problems in Afghanistan were more complicated than the ones he had faced in Iraq during his tour and required removing widespread sanctuaries and strongholds.
Observers have argued that the mission in Afghanistan is hampered by a lack of agreement on objectives, a lack of resources, lack of coordination, too much focus on the central government at the expense of local and provincial governments, and too much focus on the country instead of the region. In , Afghanistan moved three places in Transparency International 's annual index of corruption, becoming the world's second most-corrupt country just ahead of Somalia.
Eight years is enough to know better about the corrupt, mafia system of President Hamid Karzai. My people are crushed between two powerful enemies. From the sky, occupation forces bomb and kill civilians … and on the ground, the Taliban and warlords continue their crimes. It is better that they leave my country; my people are that fed up. Occupation will never bring liberation, and it is impossible to bring democracy by war.
Pakistan plays a central role in the conflict. The question is what does Pakistan's army want to achieve …? They want to gain influence in the region" [] About the presence of foreign troops in Afghanistan he stated: By May the Afghan Army had accomplished this interim goal and was on track to reach its ultimate number of , by In , the Afghan National Army had limited fighting capacity. In one new unit in Baghlan Province , soldiers had been found cowering in ditches rather than fighting.
Michael Bell, who was one of a team of U. I couldn't get them to shoot their weapons. The Afghan Army was plagued by inefficiency and endemic corruption. Afghan soldiers often snipped the command wires of IEDs instead of marking them and waiting for U. This allowed insurgents to return and reconnect them. Desertion was a significant problem.
One in every four combat soldiers quit the Afghan Army during the month period ending in September , according to data from the U. Within the ANSF there are also strong external loyalties to factions who themselves compete for influence and access to resources. All this means that the ANSF may not work as they officially should. Rather it appears that the political economy of the ANSF prevents them from working like modern organisations — the very prerequisite' of the Resolute Support Mission.
There is evidence that Afghan officers and officials, especially in the higher echelons, appropriate large parts of the vast resource flows which are directed by international donors into the ANA. Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction has reported that roughly half of Afghan soldiers brought to the United States for training go absent without leave which may inhibit the operational readiness of their units back in Afghanistan, negatively impact the morale of other trainees and home units and pose security risks to the United States.
The Afghan National Police provides support to the Afghan army. Police officers in Afghanistan are also largely illiterate. Approximately 17 percent of them tested positive for illegal drugs in They were widely accused of demanding bribes. The armed opposition or anti-government elements — some Western news media tend to address them all simply as "Taliban" [] — have from into shifted their tactics from frontal attacks on pro-government forces to guerrilla type activities, including suicide, car and road side bombs IEDs , and targeted assassinations, said a UNAMA report in July In —, according to the Christian Science Monitor , 16 improvised explosive devices IEDs were planted in girls' schools in Afghanistan, but there's no certainty who did that.
In , Colonel Richard Kemp , formerly Commander of British forces in Afghanistan and current intelligence coordinator for the British government — thus part of the anti-Taliban coalition ISAF , made these comments about the Taliban tactics and strategy as he perceived them:. Like Hamas in Gaza , the Taliban in southern Afghanistan are masters at shielding themselves behind the civilian population and then melting in among them for protection.
Women and children are trained and equipped to fight, collect intelligence, and ferry arms and ammunition between battles. Female suicide bombers are increasingly common. The use of women to shield gunmen as they engage NATO forces is now so normal it is deemed barely worthy of comment. Schools and houses are routinely booby-trapped. Snipers shelter in houses deliberately filled with women and children. Beginning in , insurgent forces in Afghanistan began using a tactic of insider attacks on ISAF and Afghan military forces. In the attacks, Taliban personnel or sympathizers belonging to, or pretending to belong to, the Afghan military or police forces attack ISAF personnel, often within the security of ISAF military bases and Afghan government facilities.
In , for example, 21 insider attacks killed 35 coalition personnel. Forty-six insider attacks killed 63 and wounded 85 coalition troops, mostly American, in the first 11 months of However, on 5 August , a gunman in an Afghan military uniform opened fire on a number of international military personnel, killing a U. In November , the CNN reported widespread relief amongst Kabul's residents after the Taliban fled the city, with young men shaving off their beards and women taking off their burqas.
A one of its most favorable ratings in the world. Polls of Afghans displayed strong opposition to the Taliban and significant support of the U. However the idea of permanent U. In a June Gallup survey, about half of Afghan respondents felt that additional U. But opinions varied widely; residents in the troubled South were mostly mixed or uncertain, while those in the West largely disagreed that more U.
In December , many Afghan tribal heads and local leaders from the south and east called for U. In late January , Afghan protesters took to the streets for three straight days and blocked traffic on a highway that links Kabul and Kandahar.
War in Afghanistan (2001–present)
Ghazni residents insisted that the dead were civilians. Only Israel and Kenya citizens were in favor of the war.
The authors of the survey mentioned a "global unease with major world powers" and in America that "Afghan War not worth it". Majorities in 7 out of 12 NATO member countries wanted troops withdrawn as soon as possible. In there was a strong opposition to war in Afghanistan in 21 of 24 countries surveyed.
Only in the U. Authors of articles on the issue mentioned that "Australians lose faith in Afghan War effort" and "cruel human toll of fight to win Afghan peace". The global survey reported that majorities or pluralities in 18 out of 25 countries wanted NATO to remove their troops from Afghanistan as soon as possible. In the other 34 countries surveyed, the poll found many clear majorities that favored extradition and trial instead of military action: In a nation June survey of global public opinion, the Pew Global Attitudes Project found international opposition to the war.
Out of the 47 countries surveyed, 4 had a majority that favored keeping foreign troops: In 41, pluralities wanted NATO troops out as soon as possible. Majorities in 7 out of 12 NATO member countries said troops should be withdrawn as soon as possible. A nation Pew Global Attitudes survey in June similarly found that majorities or pluralities in 21 of 24 countries want the U.
Following that June global survey, however, public opinion in Australia and Britain diverged from that in the U. A majority of Australians and Britons now want their troops home. Almost half of Americans, 49 percent, believed that the U. That figure was an increase from 30 percent who said that in December The war has been the subject of large protests around the world starting with the large-scale demonstrations in the days leading up to the invasion and every year since.
Many protesters consider the bombing and invasion of Afghanistan to be unjustified aggression. Multiple accounts document human rights violations in Afghanistan. Amnesty International said that up to civilians were killed in by bombs, mostly on roads or carried by suicide attackers belonging to the Taliban. NATO has alleged that the Taliban have used civilians as human shields.
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A spokesman for the ISAF commander said: These were not human shields; these were human sacrifices. We have intelligence that points to this. State Department, the Taliban committed human rights violations against women in Afghanistan. But her real love was the printed page. Later, when her life had become a purgatory of violence and abuse, both cooking and literature helped save her. In what has become one of the fastest-selling books in Afghanistan , Yaganah chronicles her traumatic life. Light of Ashes, released in March, is part fiction, part gut-wrenching memoir tainted by the oppression she says almost all Afghan women suffer.
The book, she hopes, will help women break free. To help break the oppression , Yaganah breaks taboos. She writes explicitly about topics such as marital rape, menstruation and the lifelong damage caused by child marriages.
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Two people appear in the book with real names. One is Zahra, the teenage protagonist based on the author who was married at 13 to a man twice her age. Barely a teenager, she had no concept of what penetrative sex meant. The morning after, she woke up in hospital. In the book, she writes: Hate was a dress that fit snug around my body. At night when we were brought to the bedroom, without any exchange of words between us, I found Sultan by my side. But once I had put it on, I had an odd sense of having been turned into negative space, a blank in the visual field, a sort of antimatter, both there and not there.
Such a space has power of a sort, but it is a passive power, the power of taboo. Several weeks after we left Afghanistan, the war broke out. My father was right, after all. Over the next years, we often remembered the people we met and their courtesy and curiosity. How many of them are now dead, through no fault of their own? Six years after our trip, I wrote The Handmaid's Tale, a speculative fiction about an American theocracy. The women in that book wear outfits derived in part from nuns' costumes, partly from schoolgirls' hemlines, partly - I must admit - from the faceless woman on the Old Dutch Cleanser box, but also partly from the chador I acquired in Afghanistan and its conflicting associations.
As one character says, there is freedom and freedom from. But how much of the first should you have to give up in order to assure the second? All cultures have had to grapple with that, and our own - as we are now seeing - is no exception. Would I have written the book if I had never visited Afghanistan? Would it have been the same? In February , almost 24 years ago, I visited Afghanistan with my spouse, Graeme Gibson, and our month-old daughter. We went there almost by chance: