Kabul:

At least 35 people were killed and 230 injured on Monday after heavy rain in eastern Afghanistan, a local official said.

“On Monday evening, rain caused by thunderstorms killed 35 people and injured 230 others in Jalalabad and certain districts of Nangarhar” province, Quraishi Badloon, head of the department of information and culture, told AFP.

The casualties were caused by heavy storms and rains that collapsed trees, walls and roofs of people’s houses, Badloon said.

“There is a possibility that casualties might rise,” he went on, adding that the wounded as well as victims’ corpses were brought to Nangarhar regional hospital and Fatima-tul-Zahra hospital.

The tragedy comes after flash floods killed hundreds of people in Afghanistan in May and swamped agricultural lands in the country, where 80 percent of the population depends on farming to survive.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

A U.N. report says the Taliban are restricting Afghan women’s access to work, travel and healthcare if they are unmarried or don’t have a male guardian, a mahram. File
| Photo Credit: AP

The Taliban government’s morality police will play an increasing role in enforcing religious law in Afghanistan, according to a U.N. report published on July 9 that accused them of creating a “climate of fear”.

The report from the U.N. assistance mission in Afghanistan said the Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice “had negative impacts on the enjoyment of human rights and fundamental freedoms… with a discriminatory and disproportionate impact on women”.

But the report also carried a response from Taliban authorities, who said the Vice Ministry had a bigger role to play.

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The Ministry implements an austere vision of Islam, which has increasingly dominated Afghanistan since the 2021 Taliban takeover.

Morality police squads are empowered to scold, arrest and deliver punishments to citizens violating edicts which have marginalised women, effectively banned music and outlawed other activity deemed un-Islamic.

The U.N. report said there was “a climate of fear and intimidation” owing to the Ministry’s invasion of Afghans’ private lives, ambiguity over its legal powers, and the “disproportionality of punishments”.

However, in their written response Taliban authorities said the Vice Ministry is “dedicated to promoting benefits and averting harm in all spheres of peoples’ lives”.

“Its official documents, as previously stated, draw from Sharia and Islamic law, and as a result, its role is growing as required by the situation.”

The U.N. report documents the work of the Vice Ministry between the Taliban’s return to power three years ago and March of this year.

It said the Taliban government had overseen a ban on women travelling without male escorts, enforced a conservative dress code on them, barred them from public parks and shut women-run businesses.

It also introduced “measures to reduce intermingling between men and women in daily life” — while instructing barbers to refuse “Western style” haircuts for men and arresting people playing music.

In their response, the Taliban government defended their decision to enforce male escorts for women, saying they are “to safeguard her honor and chastity” while Islamic dress was “a divine obligation”.

The Vice Ministry denied banning women from public places and said it only intervened in mixed-gender environments.

Kabul:

Fresh floods killed 66 people in northern Afghanistan, a provincial official said Sunday, after weeks of flooding that has inundated farms and villages and swept away swathes of communities.

Hundreds of people have died in flash floods this month that have also swamped agricultural lands in a country where 80 percent of the population depends on farming to survive.

The latest heavy floods hit multiple districts of Faryab province on Saturday night and “resulted in human and financial losses,” said Asmatullah Muradi, spokesman for the Faryab governor, in a statement.

“Due to the floods 66 people were killed,” he said, adding that at least five people were injured and others were still missing.

The flooding damaged more than 1,500 houses, swamped more than 1,000 acres of agricultural land and killed hundreds of livestock, he said.

The floods came a day after provincial police said more than 50 people were killed in flash flooding in the western province of Ghor.

Just over a week ago, more than 300 people were killed by torrents in northern Baghlan province, according to the UN World Food Programme (WFP) and Taliban officials.

Taliban officials have warned the death counts would go up in regions impacted by flooding, as destroyed infrastructure hampered aid delivery and efforts to find the missing.

The death count from the Ghor flooding rose from 50 to 55 on Sunday, according to Abdul Wahid Hamas, a spokesman for the provincial governor.

“More than 3,000 homes were totally destroyed due to the floods” in Ghor, he added.

Videos shared on social media platform X by the WFP showed currents of brown water crashing through walls of homes and churning through streets in Ghor.

‘Washed away our life’

Residents in Baghlan, Ghor, Faryab and other affected provinces found themselves without shelter, stripped of their homes and livelihoods.

“We were inside our home when rain started and all of a sudden, a flash flood came, we were trying to get things out but it washed away our home, our life, everything,” Ghor resident Jawan Gul told AFP on Saturday.

The flooding also sparked concern for the revered 12th-century Jam minaret, located in a remote part of Ghor, provincial officials said.

Images circulated to media showed brown torrents crashing around the base of the UNESCO World Heritage Site.

“The situation of Jam was very concerning,” Abdul Hai Zaeem, information and culture director in Ghor, told AFP, adding that mud was still piled high around the brick minaret.

The WFP warned that the recent floods have compounded an already dire humanitarian situation in the impoverished country.

Spring floods are not uncommon in Afghanistan, a country of more than 40 million people, but above-average rainfall this year has sparked devastating flash flooding.

Even before the most recent spate of floods, about 100 people had been killed from mid-April to early May as a result of flooding in 10 of Afghanistan’s provinces, authorities said.

The rains come after a prolonged drought in Afghanistan, which is one of the least prepared nations to tackle climate change impacts, according to experts.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

A security officer walks outside the Afghan Embassy in New Delhi on September 30, 2023.
| Photo Credit: AP

After months of uncertainty, the embassy of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan here has finally shut down. In a message shared with the media, the mission that ran on skeletal staff and without the presence of the envoy appointed during the Presidency of Dr. Ashraf Ghani, blamed a number of factors including lack of support from the “host government” for ending operations. 

“The Embassy has experienced a notable absence of crucial support from the host government, which has hindered our ability to carry out our duties effectively,” a press statement from the mission stated. It cited “reduction in both personnel and resources” because of the arrival of the Taliban administration in Kabul and acknowledged that it has failed to meet “expectations in serving Afghanistan’s interests”. 

“Given these circumstances, it is with deep regret that we have taken the difficult decision to close all operations of the mission with the exception of emergency consular services to Afghan citizens till the transfer of the custodial authority of the mission to the host country,” the press note declared. The statement indicated at the deep divisions between the Taliban set-up in Kabul and former rulers as it cautioned against anyone in Afghan consulates in Hyderabad and Mumbai working for the present rulers of Kabul. Unlike the embassy in Delhi, the Afghan consulates in Hyderabad and Mumbai have not shut down and Consul General of Afghanistan in Mumbai Zakia Wardak had earlier announced on social media that they remain committed to serving the Afghan citizens who may require consular services in India.  

“It is our firm belief that any actions taken by these consulates are not in consonance with the objectives of a legitimate or elected government and rather serve the interests of an illegitimate regime,” the embassy said hinting at the Taliban adding, “Such activities, conducted independently, are contrary to the established norms of diplomatic representation.” The statement adds to the earlier reports of division among the ranks of the existing diplomatic staff within the embassy and the two consulates of Afghanistan.

Earlier, a source in the mission had informed The Hindu that ambassador Farid Mamundzay who left India more than three months ago did not return, creating a vacuum in the embassy which was deepened with the departure of at least four other senior officials, including his personal secretary. The Afghan embassy in New Delhi’s diplomatic enclave — Chanakyapuri — has been a witness to the tumultuous political history of Afghanistan and was handled by a varying number of political bosses in Kabul as governments changed multiple times starting from the late 1970s. However, the mission was not manned by the Taliban since the outfit became politically prominent starting with the 1996 overthrow and assassination of President Mohammed Najibullah.

After the fall of the last President of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan Dr. Ghani, India did not recognise the Taliban regime in Kabul and since June 2022 has maintained a “technical team” in the Indian embassy in Kabul. New Delhi is therefore not in a formal diplomatic relation with the Taliban set-up in Kabul and the outfit is unlikely to gain immediate ownership of the embassy that has belonged to the rulers of Kabul conventionally. 

The mission said that the decision to shut down was taken in accordance with the Article 45 of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, 1961, declaring that all property belonging to it will be transferred to the “custodial authority of the host country”. 

The public statement from the mission urged the government of India to continue to fly the flag of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan that was in existence between 2004 and 2021. Shutting of the mission in the absence of formal diplomatic ties with the Taliban has placed a question mark on the consular requirements of many Afghan students, traders and tourists who have been affected by the presence of the Taliban in Kabul. Afghanistan at present has two weekly flights to Delhi that ferry Afghan citizens to India but sources in the Afghan embassy said, visa-related difficulties have forced the flights to be largely used for cargo purposes. Interestingly, the closure came hours after the Moscow format dialogue on Afghanistan was held in Kazan, Russia, where the Taliban participated in discussion with stakeholders that included India. Taliban had earlier urged India to help in establishing economic stability of Afghanistan.

The Taliban have waged a systematic assault on the freedom of Afghanistan’s people, including women and girls experiencing “immeasurably cruel” oppression, the U.N.’s human rights chief said.
| Photo Credit: AP

The Taliban have waged a systematic assault on the freedom of Afghanistan’s people, including women and girls experiencing “immeasurably cruel” oppression, the U.N.’s human rights chief said on Tuesday.

United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk said that human rights are in a state of collapse in Afghanistan more than two years after the Taliban returned to power and stripped back institutional protections at all levels. He urged U.N. member states to help fill the void.

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“The shocking level of oppression of Afghan women and girls is immeasurably cruel,” Mr. Turk said during a meeting of the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva. “Afghanistan has set a devastating precedent as the only country in the world where women and girls are denied access to secondary and higher education.”

The Taliban regained control of Afghanistan on August 15, 2021, as U.S. and NATO forces withdrew from the country after more than two decades of war. They initially promised a more moderate approach than during they during their previous rule from 1996 to 2001 but gradually reimposed their harsh interpretation of Islamic law, or Sharia.

Along with excluding girls and women from education beyond sixth grade, most forms of employment and many public spaces, the Taliban have harassed or beaten women at checkpoints for failing to wear a hijab, or Islamic headscarf, according to a report Turk presented to the Human Rights Council. They have ordered women to return home from markets for shopping without a male guardian.

With female lawyers and judges excluded from working or practicing law, women and girls have less ability to obtain legal representation and access to justice, the report stated.

The Taliban edicts have prompted an international outcry. But officials, including the supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada, have told other countries to stop interfering in Afghanistan’s internal affairs.

Nobody from the Taliban was immediately available for comment on the U.N. report.

IMF delegates participate in a news conference on the IMF release of the World Economic Outlook Update, at IMF headquarters in Washington, DC, on July 25, 2023.
| Photo Credit: AFP

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