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  1. #201
    Thailand Expat OhOh's Avatar
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    To reach a peace deal, Taliban say Afghan president must go

    By KATHY GANNON yesterday

    "The Taliban say they don’t want to monopolize power, but they insist there won’t be peace in Afghanistan until there is a new negotiated government in Kabul and President Ashraf Ghani is removed.
    In an interview with The Associated Press, Taliban spokesman, Suhail Shaheen, who is also a member of the group’s negotiating team, laid out the insurgents’ stance on what should come next in a country on the precipice.



    The Taliban have swiftly captured territory in recent weeks, seized strategic border crossings and are threatening a number of provincial capitals — advances that come as the last U.S. and NATO soldiers leave Afghanistan.



    This week, the top U.S. military officer, Gen. Mark Milley, told a Pentagon press conference that the Taliban have “strategic momentum,” and he did not rule out a complete Taliban takeover. But he said it is not inevitable. “I don’t think the end game is yet written,” he said.



    Memories of the Taliban’s last time in power some 20 years ago, when they enforced a harsh brand of Islam that denied girls an education and barred women from work, have stoked fears of their return among many. Afghans who can afford it are applying by the thousands for visas to leave Afghanistan, fearing a violent descent into chaos. The U.S.-NATO withdrawal is more than 95% complete and due to be finished by Aug. 31.



    Shaheen said the Taliban will lay down their weapons when a negotiated government acceptable to all sides in the conflict is installed in Kabul and Ghani’s government is gone.


    “I want to make it clear that we do not believe in the monopoly of power because any governments who (sought) to monopolize power in Afghanistan in the past, were not successful governments,” said Shaheen, apparently including the Taliban’s own five-year rule in that assessment. “So we do not want to repeat that same formula.”


    But he was also uncompromising on the continued rule of Ghani, calling him a war monger and accusing him of using his Tuesday speech on the Islamic holy day of Eid-al-Adha to promise an offensive against the Taliban.

    Shaheen dismissed Ghani’s right to govern, resurrecting allegations of widespread fraud that surrounded Ghani’s 2019 election win. After that vote, both Ghani and his rival Abdullah Abdullah declared themselves president. After a compromise deal, Abdullah is now No. 2 in the government and heads the reconciliation council.


    Asked about the Taliban demand that Ghani be removed as a condition of a peace agreement, White House press secretary Jen Psaki on Friday affirmed President Joe Biden’s support for the Afghan president.

    “The President and the administration supports the leadership of the Afghan people, including Ashraf Ghani,” Psaki said.


    In a phone call Friday, Biden told Ghani that he’s included $3.3 billion for Afghan security forces in his fiscal year 2022 budget request, according to the White House.
    The military aid includes $1 billion to support the Afghan Air Force and Special Mission Wing, $1 billion for fuel, ammunition and spare parts, and $700 million to pay salaries for Afghan soldiers.

    The White House said in a statement that the two leaders agreed that the Taliban’s military offensive “is in direct contradiction to the movement’s claim to support a negotiated settlement of the conflict.”



    Ghani has often said he will remain in office until new elections can determine the next government. His critics — including ones outside the Taliban — accuse him of seeking only to keep power, causing splits among government supporters.


    Last weekend, Abdullah headed a high-level delegation to the Qatari capital of Doha for talks with Taliban leaders. It ended with promises of more talks, as well as greater attention to the protection of civilians and infrastructure.

    Shaheen called the talks a good beginning. But he said the government’s repeated demands for a cease-fire while Ghani stayed in power were tantamount to demanding a Taliban surrender.


    “They don’t want reconciliation, but they want surrendering,” he said.

    Before any cease-fire, there must be an agreement on a new government “acceptable to us and to other Afghans,” he said. Then “there will be no war.”


    Shaheen said under this new government, women will be allowed to work, go to school, and participate in politics, but will have to wear the hijab, or headscarf. He said women won’t be required to have a male relative with them to leave their home, and that Taliban commanders in newly occupied districts have orders that universities, schools and markets operate as before, including with the participation of women and girls.

    However, there have been repeated reports from captured districts of Taliban imposing harsh restrictions on women, even setting fire to schools. One gruesome video that emerged appeared to show Taliban killing captured commandos in northern Afghanistan.



    Shaheen said some Taliban commanders had ignored the leadership’s orders against repressive and drastic behavior and that several have been put before a Taliban military tribunal and punished, though he did provide specifics. He contended the video was fake, a splicing of separate footage.


    Shaheen said there are no plans to make a military push on Kabul and that the Taliban have so far “restrained” themselves from taking provincial capitals. But he warned they could, given the weapons and equipment they have acquired in newly captured districts. He contended that the majority of the Taliban’s battlefield successes came through negotiations, not fighting.

    “Those districts which have fallen to us and the military forces who have joined us ... were through mediation of the people, through talks,” he said. “They (did not fall) through fighting ... it would have been very hard for us to take 194 districts in just eight weeks.”


    The Taliban control about half of Afghanistan’s 419 district centers, and while they have yet to capture any of the 34 provincial capitals, they are pressuring about half of them, Milley said. In recent days, the U.S. has carried out airstrikes in support of beleaguered Afghan government troops in the southern city of Kandahar, around which the Taliban have been amassing, Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said Thursday.

    The rapid fall of districts and the seemingly disheartened response by Afghan government forces have prompted U.S.-allied warlords to resurrect militias with a violent history. For many Afghans weary of more than four decades of war, that raises fears of a repeat of the brutal civil war in the early 1990s in which those same warlords battled for power.



    “You know, no one no one wants a civil war, including me,” said Shaheen.


    Shaheen also repeated Taliban promises aimed at reassuring Afghans who fear the group.

    Washington has promised to relocate thousands of U.S. military interpreters. Shaheen said they had nothing to fear from the Taliban and denied threatening them. But, he added, if some want to take asylum in the West because Afghanistan’s economy is so poor, “that is up to them.”


    He also denied that the Taliban have threatened journalists and Afghanistan’s nascent civil society, which has been targeted by dozens of killings over the past year.

    The Islamic State group has taken responsibility for some, but the Afghan government has blamed the Taliban for most of the killings while the Taliban in turn accuse the Afghan government of carrying out the killings to defame them. Rarely has the government made arrests into the killings or revealed the findings of its investigations.



    Shaheen said journalists, including those working for Western media outlets, have nothing to fear from a government that includes the Taliban.


    “We have not issued letters to journalists (threatening them), especially to those who are working for foreign media outlets. They can continue their work even in the future,” he said."

    To reach a peace deal, Taliban say Afghan president must go
    A tray full of GOLD is not worth a moment in time.

  2. #202
    Thailand Expat OhOh's Avatar
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    US Launched Several Airstrikes in Support of Afghan Forces

    22 Jul 2021
    Associated Press | By Robert Burns

    "The U.S. military launched several airstrikes this week in support of Afghan government forces fighting Taliban insurgents, including in the strategically important province of Kandahar, officials said Thursday.

    The strikes demonstrate U.S. intentions to continue supporting Afghan forces with combat aircraft based outside the country, at least until the scheduled conclusion of the U.S. military withdrawal on Aug. 31. The Biden administration has not said whether it will continue that support after the pullout is complete.

    The U.S. has a variety of combat aircraft based in the Middle East within range of Afghanistan, including warplanes aboard an aircraft carrier in the region and fighters and bombers in the Persian Gulf area.

    Asked by a reporter about news reports of a Navy FA-18 airstrike in the Kandahar area, Pentagon press secretary John Kirby did not confirm specifics, including the type of aircraft or location, but said, "In the last several days we have acted, through airstrikes, to support the ANDSF," using an acronym for the Afghan national defense and security forces. "But I won't get into technical details of those strikes."
    These are the first known U.S. airstrikes in Afghanistan since Gen. Scott Miller, who had been the top U.S. commander in the country, relinquished his command and left the country last week. The authority to launch airstrikes against the Taliban has since been in the hands of Gen. Frank McKenzie, the commander of U.S. Central Command, who oversees U.S. military involvement in the greater Middle East.

    Following Kirby's comments, another defense official said that on Wednesday and Thursday, the United States conducted a total of more than four airstrikes in support of Afghan forces. At least two of the strikes were to destroy military equipment, including an artillery piece and a vehicle, that the Taliban had taken from Afghan forces, the official said. The Afghans requested those strikes, as well as those targeting Taliban fighting positions, including at least one strike in the southern province of Kandahar.

    U.S. officials have urged the Afghans to make use of their own combat aircraft, as well as their U.S.-trained ground forces. In recent months the Afghan forces have ceded a significant amount of territory to the Taliban, raising questions about their ability to hold out after the U.S. completes its withdrawal.

    At a Pentagon news conference Wednesday, Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the future of Afghanistan is in the hands of the Afghan people, urging them to assert their will on the battlefield.
    "The Afghan security forces have the capacity to sufficiently fight and defend their country, and we will continue to support the Afghan security forces where necessary in accordance with the guidance from the president and the secretary of defense," Milley said.
    Milley said the Taliban now control about half of the 419 district centers in Afghanistan, and while they have yet to capture any of the country's 34 provincial capitals, they are pressuring about half of them. As the Taliban seize more territory, the Afghan security forces are consolidating their positions to protect key population centers, including Kabul, he said.

    "A significant amount of territory has been seized over the course of six, eight, 10 months by the Taliban, so momentum appears to be -- strategic momentum appears to be -- sort of with the Taliban," Milley said.
    Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said that after Aug. 31, which is the end date set by President Joe Biden for completing the military withdrawal, the main U.S. military focus will be on countering threats to the U.S. homeland from extremist groups inside Afghanistan. He added that the administration will provide financial and other kinds of support to Afghan defense forces, even with no combat troops or strike aircraft based there.

    "Make no mistake that we remain committed to helping the Afghan security forces and the Afghan government going forward, and we are doing what we said we were going to do in terms of putting the pieces in place to ensure that we can provide that support," Austin said."

    US Launched Several Airstrikes in Support of Afghan Forces | Military.com

    One wonders if others may join the "commitment" or decide to help another Afghani political party.

  3. #203
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    So, texy's midnight runners bravely fled on the midnight, and are now bravely bombing the Taliban from a safe distance instead. Such chivalry.

  4. #204
    Thailand Expat harrybarracuda's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by sabang View Post
    So, texy's midnight runners bravely fled on the midnight, and are now bravely bombing the Taliban from a safe distance instead. Such chivalry.
    I'm not sure the talitubbies with their cowardly IEDs and child suicide bombers are really a good example of "a fair fight".


  5. #205
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    Quote Originally Posted by harrybarracuda View Post
    I'm not sure the talitubbies with their cowardly IEDs and child suicide bombers are really a good example of "a fair fight".
    Touche

    U.S. leaves its last Afghan base, effectively ending operations-7lha-gif

  6. #206
    Thailand Expat OhOh's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by harrybarracuda View Post
    I'm not sure the talitubbies
    One is right to be cautious regarding anybody's future actions.

    ameristan however has a serious history of ignoring/welching on its signed/whispered/fake agreements/leaders announcements.

    From the state department press, from an aircraft carrier's deck, the campaign trail ....

  7. #207
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    An interesting view how it is seen by Yakov Kedmi (Yakov Josifovich Kazakov), a former director of the Israeli repatriation office NATIV, which was considered one of Israel's secret services. (excerpts from his talk with a Russian journalist Alexander Gur-Arie):


    And today, all this mess, which is in Afghanistan - after the departure of Soviet troops, there was only one force that could and did hold Afghanistan, for three years, it was Najibullah, it was the Communists.

    Afghanistan was a normal state. Factories, universities, roads were built, schools worked. It was a normal secular state. Well, yes, he was led by a communist, Najibullah. But the Americans, along with the Pakistanis and the English, decided to overthrow him and, with the help of the Taliban, overthrew him. In three years.

    And they had excellent helpers, it was Gorbachev and then Yeltsin, who sold him, deprived him of the supplies of weapons they promised him. They deceived him, betrayed him by guaranteeing his life if he hid at their embassy. And when they pulled him out of the embassy and hanged him, Yeltsin washed his hands. And since then, the Taliban has been a major force in Afghanistan. The Taliban became one of the most extremist, fundamentalist Islamic movements, an alliance with which Al Qaeda, armed with Americans and Saudis, emerged, as well as Bin Laden, who rose there and became known during the war in Afghanistan. He fought with the Taliban side by side. It was difficult to distinguish where the Taliban commanders were and where Al Qaeda often passed from one to the other. And this Islamic, terrorist, extremist Taliban has come to the forefront of Afghanistan.
    ---
    The Americans are leaving. They left. They had been stuck there for twenty years. They did not build a single school, a single factory, a single road, they did not create any state structure. They have developed only one industry - narcotics. It was under their leadership, in their power, in their complicity, that the Taliban became one of the largest opium traders in the world. And after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the transport of narcotics went from Afghanistan mainly through Kyrgyzstan and through Tajikistan, which is what the Americans achieved!

    And now that they have destroyed everything with their filth - they are leaving. They threw everything away, threw away their friends, threw away those who served them, sent them to their deaths. They have already begun to kill them. Just as they came and ruined everything in Iraq, they destroyed Iraq. They created IGIL, caused IGIL to form. And they are about to leave Iraq just like that now. They trained the Iraqi army, which disintegrated under the onslaught of those Islamist bandits on jeeps. American officers: "We will create an army!" Yes, they created an army. Under Saddam Hussein, the army was many times stronger. And the same in Afghanistan. And does anyone think that the same unfortunates who, figuratively speaking, were on US military bayonets will save the government in Afghanistan? No, I don't see the slightest chance.

  8. #208
    Thailand Expat harrybarracuda's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by OhOh View Post
    One is right to be cautious regarding anybody's future actions.

    ameristan however has a serious history of ignoring/welching on its signed/whispered/fake agreements/leaders announcements.

    From the state department press, from an aircraft carrier's deck, the campaign trail ....
    I have no idea what what you are gibbering on about or how it is relevant.

    Meanwhile, our talitubbie friends are are back to their old tricks.

    33 people assassinated in Taliban-held areas in Afghanistan's Kandahar province


    33 people assassinated in Taliban-held areas in Afghanistan's Kandahar province

  9. #209
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    Quote Originally Posted by harrybarracuda View Post
    Meanwhile, our talitubbie friends are are back to their old tricks.
    Our expert on "talitubbies" (and on chinkies) knows it better than US defence secretary who just said in Alaska (far from worries):

    "In terms of whether or not it will stop the Taliban, I think the first thing to do is to make sure that they can slow the momentum," Austin said, speaking as the U.S. military is set to end its mission in Afghanistan on Aug. 31, on orders from President Joe Biden.

    Austin added that he believed the Afghans had the capability and the capacity to make progress, but "we'll see what happens."
    First task for Afghan forces is to slow Taliban'''s momentum -Pentagon chief | Reuters

  10. #210
    Thailand Expat OhOh's Avatar
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    Taliban paves a diplomatic path to victory

    China, Russia and Pakistan's interests all increasingly align with a Taliban military win and takeover of Kabul


    by Salman Rafi Sheikh July 25, 2021

    "As the Taliban notches victory after victory on Afghanistan’s battlefields, consolidating ever-more territorial control over the war-torn nation, the militant group once widely branded as a terror outfit is also stealing a march on the diplomatic stage. Meeting by meeting, the Taliban’s budding contacts with China, Russia, Iran and neighboring Central Asian states have lifted the rebel group further above ground, diplomatic legitimacy that is giving it another edge over President Ashraf Ghani’s besieged administration.

    The Taliban is presenting itself in diplomatic circles not only as the leading force capable of stabilizing Afghanistan, but also as an indispensable political actor that concerned states must engage if they seek influence over the nation’s future policy and direction.

    By all accounts, Ghani’s US-backed government is now losing its war with a resurgent Taliban, seen in the militant group’s push forward as it seizes ever-larger swathes of territory in the wake of America’s faster-than-expected troop withdrawal.

    Despite years of training from US and NATO advisors, Afghan National Security Forces are now abandoning posts, relinquishing weapons and even defecting as the Taliban pushes north and northwest. A US intelligence report cited in news reports anticipates the fall of Kabul within six months.

    China, Russia and Pakistan, among others, no doubt saw this writing on the wall much earlier and have hedged their diplomatic bets by engaging Taliban representatives.
    In Beijing’s particular case, it has dangled potential infrastructure deals before the Taliban to connect the country to its Belt and Road. Ghani’s recent public complaint about Pakistan’s support for the Taliban reflects Islamabad’s bet that the militant group will likely come out on top in the months ahead.

    While all of Afghanistan’s neighbors believe that some sort of an “intra-Afghan” settlement is necessary for stability and to avoid a large-scale civil war on their borders, fewer and fewer seem to see the current Ghani regime playing a leading role in the future.
    Indeed, engagement with Ghani could jeopardize their interests if the Taliban perceives it is coming at its expense.
    Mushahid Hussain Syed, who heads Pakistan’s Defence Committee in the Senate, recently acknowledged that regional countries – namely Russia, China and Iran – have already “reconciled to a Taliban-dominated Afghanistan.”


    Crucially that includes neighboring Pakistan, which will bear the brunt of any mass refugee flows if Afghanistan descends into full-scale civil war, with the Taliban on one side and Ghani’s national forces backed by various warlords and geographical-based militias on the other.
    Videos now circulating on social media show wounded Taliban fighters receiving medical treatment in Pakistan’s Balochistan province, one clear sign of support that likely contributed to Ghani’s recent criticism.
    The US, of course, set the Taliban’s diplomatic train in motion through its diplomatic engagement, recognition that resulted in the February 2020 Doha pact that set the terms for America’s troop withdrawal.

    As part of that deal, the Taliban promised to cut ties with terror groups like al Qaeda, terms which critics claim the extremist group hasn’t clearly upheld. It has broadly refrained from attacking withdrawing US troops, training its assaults instead on the Afghan national forces the US trained and armed.

    While the Taliban have engaged in talks with Ghani’s government, the exchanges to date have been more about the form than the substance of negotiations. Observers and analysts now await the Taliban’s promised “peace plan”, which its spokesmen claim it will present to Ghani’s negotiators next month.

    As such, some now wonder if the Taliban, with a clear eye on conducting foreign policy before it seizes Kabul, may be coordinating and potentially even clearing its military advances with certain of these outside states. The Taliban has in recent weeks seized control of key border trade outposts.
    In a July 11 statement, the Taliban said the purpose of its diplomacy is not only to reiterate its commitment to “dialogue”, but also to develop “understanding” with these states with a view to address their concerns and fears. The statement said:

    “[a] delegation of the Islamic Emirate [Taliban] traveled to the Russian capital Moscow because large swaths in the northern parts of the country had recently come under the control of Mujahideen and the Islamic Emirate sought to allay fears of Russia and other Central Asian countries, and to assure them that no foreign country shall face any harm from Afghanistan.”

    Turkey is the outlier in the Taliban’s diplomatic blitz. The Taliban has vociferously opposed the possible continued presence of Turkish troops in Afghanistan, including at key infrastructure in the capital Kabul.

    While the Taliban clearly see Turkey’s military presence as a violation of national sovereignty, Russia and China likely fear Turkey will seek to support and foment transnational jihadi networks known to be situated in Afghanistan’s north.


    These include the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, an ethnic Uighur extremist group responsible for past terror attacks in China and which seeks to transform China’s Xinjiang region into an independent Islamic state. Turkey is home to a large exiled Uighur community, many of whom fled persecution in China.
    The deputy governor of Afghanistan’s northern Badakhshan province recently said in a media interview that the militant groups overrunning national forces in the province are largely multi-ethnic, including Tajiks, Chechens, Uighurs and Uzbeks.

    While currently allied with the Taliban, the transitional jihadis could switch sides and become a Turkish insurgent proxy if they perceive the Taliban seeks to abandon them in exchange for China’s, Russia’s and Iran’s diplomatic recognition and potential aid for reconstruction.

    Security analysts say the militant groups could be deployed similarly to the war in Syria, a war model that would be directed against China, Russia and their interests in Central Asia. The analysts suspect the militant groups may have helped to stage the recent deadly blast that killed at least nine Chinese engineers and nationals while traveling in a bus in Pakistan.


    To some, the Taliban is already showing its willingness to conduct foreign policy in line with the wishes of China, Russia and other key regional stakeholders. While the Taliban is now focused on military victory against Ghani’s crumbling regime, it will still need all the outside support it can get to finally topple and then hold Kabul."


    Taliban paves a diplomatic path to victory - Asia Times

  11. #211
    Thailand Expat harrybarracuda's Avatar
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    As the Taliban notches victory after victory on Afghanistan’s battlefields, consolidating ever-more territorial control over the war-torn nation, the militant group once widely branded as a terror outfit is also stealing a march on the diplomatic stage. Meeting by meeting, the Taliban’s budding contacts with China, Russia, Iran and neighboring Central Asian states have lifted the rebel group further above ground, diplomatic legitimacy that is giving it another edge over President Ashraf Ghani’s besieged administration.
    Which is just a really long winded way of saying everyone knows the talitubbies will soon topple the Afghan government and the brief flirtation with democracy in Afghanistan will evaporate.

  12. #212
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    Afghanistan imposes curfew as fears of Taliban atrocities grow

    Afghanistan’s government has imposed a night-time curfew across most of the country in an attempt to counter surging violence unleashed by a Taliban offensive.

    Since early May, when the US-led forces began their withdrawal, Taliban fighters have captured dozens of districts, encircled several provincial capitals and taken key border crossings.

    The curfew was imposed between 10pm and 4pm in 31 of the 34 Afghan provinces, all apart from Kabul, Panjshir and Nangarhar.

    The Taliban now controls about half of Afghanistan’s roughly 400 districts.

    More than 22,000 Afghan families have fled to escape fighting in the former Taliban bastion of Kandahar, according to Afghan officials.

    Lalai Dastageri, deputy governor of Kandahar province, said: “The negligence of some security forces, especially the police, has made way for the Taliban to come that close. We are now trying to organise our security forces.”

    Four camps have been set up for the displaced families who were estimated to number 154,000 people.

    Khan Mohammad, who was in a camp with his family, said: “If they really want to fight, they should go to a desert and fight, not destroy the city. Even if they win, they can’t rule a ghost town.”

    Kandahar has a population of 650,000 and is the second largest city in the country after Kabul.

    The southern province was the epicentre of the Taliban’s regime when they ruled Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001. The US will continue air strikes in support of Afghan forces fighting the Taliban, a top US general said yesterday. “We are prepared to continue this heightened level of support in the coming weeks if the Taliban continue their attacks,” General Kenneth McKenzie, head of the US Army’s Central Command, told reporters in Kabul.

    The Taliban’s march through northern Afghanistan gained momentum at the weekend with the capture of several districts from fleeing Afghan forces, several hundred of whom fled across the border into Tajikistan.

    More than 300 Afghan military personnel crossed from Afghanistan’s Badakhshan province as Taliban fighters advanced toward the border, Tajikistan’s State Committee for National Security said in a statement.

    Since mid-April, when President Joe Biden announced the end to Afghanistan’s “forever war,” the Taliban have made strides throughout the country. But their most significant gains have been in the northern half of the country, a traditional stronghold of the US-allied warlords who helped defeat them in 2001.

    The gains in northeastern Badakhshan province in recent days have mostly come to the insurgent movement without a fight, said Mohib-ul Rahman, a provincial council member. He blamed Taliban successes on the poor morale of troops who are mostly outnumbered and without resupplies.

    “Unfortunately, the majority of the districts were left to Taliban without any fight,” said Mr Rahman.

    Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid confirmed the fall of the districts and said most were without a fight. The Taliban in previous surrenders have shown video of Afghan soldiers taking transportation money and returning to their homes.

    Afghanistan imposes curfew as fears of Taliban atrocities grow - Independent.ie

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    Thailand Expat misskit's Avatar
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    Afghan soldiers seek refuge in Pakistan after losing border military posts to Taliban

    ISLAMABAD: Forty-six Afghan soldiers sought refuge in Pakistan after losing control of military positions across the border following advances by Taliban insurgents, Pakistan`s army said on Monday.




    Hundreds of Afghan army soldiers and civil officials have fled to neighbouring Tajikistan, Iran and Pakistan in recent weeks after Taliban offensives in border areas.


    The Afghan military commander requested refuge at the border crossing in Chitral in the north, the Pakistan army said in a statement, adding the soldiers were given safe passage into Pakistan on Sunday night after clearance from Afghan authorities.


    "Afghan soldiers have been provided food, shelter and necessary medical care as per established military norms," the statement said.


    The move comes at a time of poor relations between the neighbours. Afghanistan recalled its diplomats from Pakistan after the brief kidnapping of the Afghan ambassador`s daughter in Islamabad earlier in the month.


    Afghan officials did not respond to a request for comment.


    The Taliban has escalated its offensive since the United States announced in April that it would withdraw its troops by September, ending a 20-year foreign military presence.


    Washington has said it will continue to carry out air strikes to support Afghan forces facing insurgent attacks.


    The Afghan government and Taliban negotiators have met in Qatar`s capital, Doha, in recent weeks, although diplomats say there have been few signs of substantive progress since peace talks began in September.


    Reeling from battlefield losses, Afghanistan`s military is overhauling its war strategy against the Taliban to concentrate forces around critical areas such as Kabul and other cities, border crossings and vital infrastructure, Afghan and US officials have said.


    The Pakistan army said the soldiers who sought refuge will be returned to Afghanistan after due process, as had taken place in the case of another batch of 35 soldiers earlier in July.

    Afghan soldiers seek refuge in Pakistan after losing border military posts to Taliban

  14. #214
    Thailand Expat harrybarracuda's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by misskit View Post
    Afghanistan`s military is overhauling its war strategy against the Taliban to concentrate forces around critical areas such as Kabul and other cities, border crossings and vital infrastructure, Afghan and US officials have said.
    I think they should call this "Kusta's Last Stand".

  15. #215
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    U.S. leaves its last Afghan base, effectively ending operations-jd210726-gif

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    Afghanistan will not be base for separatists – Taliban delegation tell China


    Kabul (AFP) A top-level Taliban delegation visiting China assured Beijing the group will not allow Afghanistan to be used as a base for plotting against another country, an insurgent spokesman said Wednesday.


    The delegation is in China for talks with Beijing officials, spokesman Mohammad Naeem told AFP, as the insurgents continue a sweeping offensive across Afghanistan — including areas along their shared border.


    Their frontier is just 76 kilometres (47 miles) long — and at a rugged high altitude without a road crossing — but Beijing fears Afghanistan could be used as a staging ground for Uyghur separatists in Xinjiang.


    “The Islamic Emirate assured China that Afghanistan’s soil would not be used against any country’s security,” Naeem said.


    “They (China) promised not to interfere in Afghanistan’s affairs, but instead help to solve problems and bring peace.”


    Taliban officials have cranked up their international diplomacy in recent months, seeking global recognition for when they hope to return to power.


    They have made sweeping advances across Afghanistan since May, when US-led foreign forces began the last stage of a withdrawal due to be completed next month.


    Beijing hosted a Taliban delegation in 2019, but back-door links with the insurgents stretch back longer, through Pakistan.


    Communist Party leaders in Beijing and the fundamentalist Taliban have little ideological common ground, but experts feel shared pragmatism could see mutual self-interest trump sensitive differences.


    For Beijing, a stable and cooperative administration in Kabul would pave the way for an expansion of its Belt and Road Initiative into Afghanistan and through the Central Asian republics.


    The Taliban, meanwhile, would consider China a crucial source of investment and economic support.


    “China can deal with the Taliban… but they still find the Taliban’s religious agenda and motivations inherently discomforting,” Andrew Small, author of “The China–Pakistan Axis”, told AFP earlier this month.


    “They have never been sure how willing or able the Taliban really are to enforce agreements on issues such as harbouring Uyghur militants.”


    The Taliban’s campaign has so far seen them capture scores of districts, border crossings and encircle several provincial capitals.


    Government forces have abandoned some rural districts without a fight, but are digging in to defend provincial capitals even as the insurgents tighten a noose around the cities.


    Rights groups have accused the insurgents of committing atrocities in territories under their control, including in the border town of Spin Boldak, where Afghan officials accuse Taliban fighters of killing around 100 civilians.


    The nine-member Taliban team in China is led by Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, co-founder of the hardline movement.

    https://thefrontierpost.com/afghanis...on-tell-china/

  17. #217
    Thailand Expat harrybarracuda's Avatar
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    The irony of Chinastan having to "trust" the talitubbies.


  18. #218
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    shared pragmatism could see mutual self-interest trump sensitive differences
    That's the bottom line.

  19. #219
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    Chris Hedges sticks the boot in. But he's right:-


    The Collective Suicide Machine


    The return of the Taliban to power will be one more signpost of the end of the American empire — and nobody will be held accountable.


    by Chris Hedges


    PRINCETON, NEW JERSEY (Scheerpost) The debacle in Afghanistan, which will unravel into chaos with lightning speed over the next few weeks and ensure the return of the Taliban to power, is one more signpost of the end of the American empire. The two decades of combat, the one trillion dollars we spent, the 100,000 troops deployed to subdue Afghanistan, the high-tech gadgets, artificial intelligence, cyberwarfare, Reaper drones armed with Hellfire missiles and GBU-30 bombs and the Global Hawk drones with high-resolution cameras, Special Operations Command composed of elite rangers, SEALs and air commandos, black sites, torture, electronic surveillance, satellites, attack aircraft, mercenary armies, infusions of millions of dollars to buy off and bribe the local elites and train an Afghan army of 350,000 that has never exhibited the will to fight, failed to defeat a guerrilla army of 60,000 that funded itself through opium production and extortion in one of the poorest countries on earth.


    Like any empire in terminal decay, no one will be held accountable for the debacle or for the other debacles in Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Yemen or anywhere else. Not the generals. Not the politicians. Not the CIA and intelligence agencies. Not the diplomats. Not the obsequious courtiers in the press who serve as cheerleaders for war. Not the compliant academics and area specialists. Not the defense industry. Empires at the end are collective suicide machines. The military becomes in late empire unmanageable, unaccountable, and endlessly self-perpetuating, no matter how many fiascos, blunders and defeats it visits upon the carcass of the nation, or how much money it plunders, impoverishing the citizenry and leaving governing institutions and the physical infrastructure decayed.

    The human tragedy — at least 801,000 people have been killed by direct war violence in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen, and Pakistan and 37 million have been displaced in and from Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, the Philippines, Libya, and Syria according to The Watson Institute at Brown University — is reduced to a neglected footnote.

    Full Article- Chris Hedges: The Collective Suicide Machine (mintpressnews.com)



  20. #220
    Thailand Expat harrybarracuda's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by sabang View Post
    Chris Hedges sticks the boot in. But he's right:-

    Is he bollocks.

    With the exception of Iraq, which you seem to think would have been better off having its Shi'a majority locked up or executed on a whim, the rest of them were all failed states long before the US did anything.

    Why doesn't Russia go in and prop up a friendly dictator or two?

    It sort of worked a bit in Syria, and Putin is only responsible for the deaths of a few hundred thousand. *



    * oh and millions of refugees.

  21. #221
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    Do read the full article 'arry, I'm sure you will be stimulated by it.


    "While rising empires are often judicious, even rational in their application of armed force for conquest and control of overseas dominions, fading empires are inclined to ill-considered displays of power, dreaming of bold military masterstrokes that would somehow recoup lost prestige and power,” the historian Alfred McCoy writes “In the Shadows of the American Century: The Rise and Decline of US Global Power.”

  22. #222
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    Quote Originally Posted by misskit View Post
    Kabul (AFP) A top-level Taliban delegation visiting China assured Beijing the group will not allow Afghanistan to be used as a base for plotting against another country, an insurgent spokesman said Wednesday.
    I knew it !

    The whole 9-11 thing wasn't Afghanistan related



    But who did it then ?


    Where's ENT when you need him

  23. #223
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    Saddam Hussein, obviously.

  24. #224
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    Ah yes; forgot that.

    The cave guy from Afghanistan was blamed first and Saddam later.

    My mistake

  25. #225
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    Quote Originally Posted by misskit View Post
    Afghanistan`s military is overhauling its war strategy against the Taliban to concentrate forces around critical areas such as Kabul and other cities, border crossings and vital infrastructure, Afghan and US officials have said.
    When will they notice some, Iran, Pakistan and Turkmenistan, are already in the Taliban hands?

    One wonders how many of these the Taliban have liberated:

    U.S. leaves its last Afghan base, effectively ending operations-moderate-terrorist-syria-manpads-jpg
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails U.S. leaves its last Afghan base, effectively ending operations-220px-redeye_surface_to_air_missile_launch-jpg  

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