Experience of Afghanistan-returnee Nepalis: Taliban do not open fire though they march along Kabul streets

KATHMANDU, Aug 17: Nepali nationals returning from Afghanistan have been kept in a quarantine center at Samakushi in Kathmandu. As many as 118 Nepalis returned from Afghanistan via Doha, Qatar on Tuesday alone. Former security personnel currently working as security guards in Kabul were among those returning on Tuesday. The Nepal Army carried out antigen tests of those people to check if they contracted COVID-19. If any of them tests positive for COVID-19, they will be sent to isolation centers for further treatment. Nepal Army took these people toSamakushi-based quarantine center on eight buses. Rabindra Thapa peeped out from the bus and said “ We did not have to suffer. The American Embassy in Kabul took good care of us. We did not have to panic as we were kept safely there. The Embassy managed everything for our safe return to Nepal and as expected we did arrive here safely.” Bishal Rai who worked in Kabul as a security guard for the past seven years -- who also returned home on Tuesday -- shared that the Taliban have allowed people to return to their homes. “I was in Afghanistan for the past seven years. I worked for the American Embassy there. The American Embassy is doing its best to send foreign nationals there safely to their homes. However, I have also heard that some other people who were working for some companies illegally have been kidnapped.” “There were no such difficulties for me but I am unaware about Nepali people living in other states” he added. “Even if the Taliban took control of Afghanistan, they are allowing foreign nationals to return to their homes. People are allowed to travel from one place to another. Foreign Embassies have already been emptied.” Prem Bahadur Pun, another Nepali national who returned from Afghanistan on Tuesday said that there was no such danger for Nepali nationals living there. “It is true that Taliban are patrolling the roads with guns and bombs but they won’t shoot you at the sight.”

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Afghanistan-Pakistan border shelling kills civilians

Afghan Taliban forces killed six civilians in Pakistan and injured at least 17 others in an "unprovoked" bombing and gunfire attack on a border town on Sunday, Pakistan says. The attack at Chaman on Sunday was condemned by Pakistan's military who said the Afghan side launched "indiscriminate fire".

The Rising Nepal कार्तिक २०७९

Afghanistan: Armed men open fire at hotel

Armed men, on Monday, opened fire inside a hotel in Afghanistan's capital Kabul, Reuters reported citing two Taliban

Nepalnews कार्तिक २०७९

Pakistan Taliban announce resumption of nationwide terror attacks

ISLAMABAD: An outlawed alliance of militant groups waging terrorism in Pakistan declared that it had ordered fighters to resume nationwide attacks, ending an already shaky “unilateral cease-fire” with the government. The Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), also known as the Pakistani Taliban, said the decision to unleash the violence was taken in retaliation to “sustained military operations” […]

Khabarhub English कार्तिक २०७९

3 including journalist killed in E. Afghanistan's shooting

KABUL, Oct. 3 : Three people, including a journalist, have been killed in a shooting in Afghanistan's eastern province of Nangarhar, authorities confirmed on Sunday. "Journalist and author Sayyed Marof Saadat along with his relatives were traveling in a sedan along a road in Police District 5 of Jalalabad city on Saturday evening when gunmen in a rickshaw opened fire on them," a security source told Xinhua anonymously. Saadat's son and the driver of the vehicle were wounded in the shooting, the source said. An independent Afghan media group Afghan Journalists Safety Committee (AJSC) has condemned the murder. No group has claimed responsibility for the shooting so far. Taliban authorities were investigating the case, according to the source. Since the Taliban takeover in mid-August, at least 10 people have been killed and many others wounded as Jalalabad, about 120 km in the east of Afghanistan's Kabul, was hit by a series of bomb attacks reportedly claimed by militants affiliated to an Islamic State group opposing the Taliban government.

Ratopati English भाद्र २०७८

Afghan protesters defy Taliban intimidation

Protesters have again taken to the streets in several parts of Afghanistan, defying Taliban pressure to stay at home. Dozens of demonstrators gathered near the Pakistan embassy in Kabul and Taliban gunmen opened fire to disperse them, protesters said.

The Rising Nepal श्रावण २०७८

Tajikistan cannot host many Afghans: authorities

DUSHANBE, Tajikistan, Sept. 2 : Tajikistan has warned that the ex-Soviet republic lacks the infrastructure to house many refugees from neighbouring Afghanistan and blamed international organisations for failing to help. The Khovar state information agency said Thursday that Interior Minister Ramazon Hamro Rahimzoda had met with the country director for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees to discuss the growing refugee and humanitarian crises in Afghanistan. During the meeting on Wednesday Rahimzoda said that 80 Afghan families currently located at the border the two countries share were seeking to cross into Tajikistan "out of fear for their lives". Rahimzoda complained that although Tajikistan had prepared areas to accept refugees, international agencies had not offered "practical assistance" to house them. "Because of this, in the Republic of Tajikistan there is no opportunity to receive a large number of refugees and asylum seekers," the state news agency quoted Rahimzoda as saying. The minister also noted that Tajikistan had "peacefully returned" 5,000 Afghan military personnel who fled over its borders as the Taliban seized control of its southern neighbour. Rahimzoda said that instability and the growing humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan risked "the transfer of terrorists to other countries," Khovar reported. The Taliban's rapid-fire rise to power has triggered alarm in Central Asian countries, notably Tajikistan, which endured a five-year civil war in the 1990s and shares a border of over 1,300 kilometres with Afghanistan. Next-door Uzbekistan said last month that it had returned 150 Afghans at the refugees' own request and after negotiating with the Taliban to guarantee their security. None of the Central Asian states bordering Afghanistan have provided totals for the numbers of refugees they have accepted since the Taliban's military offensives began in May. Tajikistan in July said it was prepared to accept 100,000 refugees from Afghanistan but quickly backtracked, citing complications related to the coronavirus among other obstacles. Unlike Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, which hosts a Russian military base, has indicated that it is not ready to hold official talks with the Taliban.

Ratopati English श्रावण २०७८

U.S. general says 12 U.S. service members killed, 15 wounded in Kabul attack

WASHINGTON, Aug. 27: The head of U.S. Central Command confirmed Thursday that 12 U.S. service members were killed in the attack at the Kabul airport in Afghanistan earlier in the day, while another 15 were wounded. Kenneth McKenzie, commander of the U.S. Central Command, told reporters during a press conference at the Defense Department that two bomb attacks happened in the morning in the Afghan capital, one at the Abbey Gate of the Hamid Karzai International Airport, which was followed by another one at the adjacent Baron Hotel. "At this time, we know that 12 U.S. service members have been killed in the attack, and 15 more service members have been injured," said McKenzie. The attacks marked one of the deadliest days in Afghanistan for U.S. forces. McKenzie said the attack at the Abbey Gate that caused U.S. casualties involved a sole suicide bomber and was followed "by a number of ISIS gunmen who opened fire on civilians and military forces," resulting in Afghan civilian casualties as well. He said details about the Baron Hotel attack were not immediately available. The Islamic State (ISIS) has claimed responsibility for the attacks, according to a statement from the group's Amaq News Agency cited in multiple reports. ISIS said in its statement that a suicide bomber "managed to reach a large gathering of translators and collaborators with the American army at 'Baran Camp' near Kabul Airport and detonated his explosive belt among them, killing about 60 people and wounding more than 100 others, including Taliban fighters," according to Reuters. At one point during the Pentagon press conference, the commander said U.S. forces currently in Afghanistan face "real" threats from terrorist groups, particularly ISIS-K, a radical affiliation of the Islamic State that the Taliban has been fighting against. McKenzie went on to say that U.S. military officials are aware that the threat to U.S. forces posed by ISIS "is extremely real," adding that "we believe it is their desire to continue those attacks, and we expect those attacks to continue, and we are doing everything we can to be prepared for those attacks." He said U.S. preparedness effort includes "reaching out to the Taliban," whom the Unites States is continuing to coordinate with in the ongoing mission to evacuate U.S. citizens out of Afghanistan. The evacuation mission "remains" uninterrupted by the blasts, McKenzie said. "We are still committed to flying people out up until we terminate the operations at some point towards the end of the month." Speaking of searching for and holding those responsible for the attacks to account, McKenzie said "we are working very hard right now to determine attribution, to determine who is associated with this cowardly attack and we're prepared to take action against them." President Joe Biden, who has been in the White House since the morning monitoring the situation with cabinet officials including the secretaries of state and defense, is scheduled to deliver remarks on the deadly blasts later in the afternoon. Originally scheduled for Thursday, the president's meeting with Israel's prime minister has been rescheduled for Friday, the White House said. The attacks came as the United States has been scrambling to evacuate Americans and its Afghan partners from the country since the Taliban entered Kabul on Aug. 15.

Ratopati English श्रावण २०७८

Deadly Jalalabad protests as Taliban consolidate Islamist rule

More than a dozen people were injured after Taliban militants opened fire on protesters in the eastern city, two witnesses and a former police official told Reuters.

The Kathmandu Post श्रावण २०७८