Following is the April 2023 installment of “Afghanistan Terrorism Report.” The authors provide a monthly analysis concerning the developing terrorist threat in Afghanistan as well as a comprehensive overview of that month’s al-Qaeda and ISIS-K propaganda.
Although ISIS-K-linked propaganda outlets did not highlight various attacks that the group conducted in Afghanistan in April, it seems clear that terror operations perpetrated by ISIS-K continued in the country, albeit in a reduced manner. This mirrors the developments in other regions in which ISIS-K is active. In the past years, ISIS-core had regularly announced so-called “Ramadan campaigns,” using the holy month of Ramadan for increased activities in several conflict zones paired with propaganda efforts. However, this year no such campaign was announced. Consequently, while terror attacks continued in the conflict regions where ISIS affiliates operate, for example, in the Sahel region, no significant increase in the overall operational tempo was observable.
As expected, in April, American officials confirmed that the Taliban had killed the ISIS-K leader of the attack on the Kabul airport in August 2021, ISIS-linked propaganda outlets did not report his death or eulogize him. However, pro-ISIS-K propaganda outlets claimed in several posts that the Taliban are cooperating with the United States on counterterrorism issues. One pro-ISIS-K linked post alleged that the killing of Ayman al-Zawahiri in Kabul on July 31, 2022, was made possible by information leaked by Taliban rivals of the Haqqani Network that sheltered him. This claim seems to mirror the suggestion by some experts that U.S. counterterrorism operations in Afghanistan depend to a certain extent on information provided by the Taliban. ISIS-linked outlets also highlighted the role of Pakistan in the alleged counterterrorism cooperation between the United States and the Taliban regime. Interestingly, although ISIS-linked outlets only highlighted a handful of attacks in April, the majority of these were conducted in Pakistan. This could be an indication that ISIS-K intends to increase its operational area beyond the border of Afghanistan in the coming months.
Pro-ISIS propaganda outlets continued to attack the Taliban on ideological grounds. One frequent theme was the activities of Iranian officials regarding Afghanistan’s western Province of Nangarhar. Pro-ISIS outlets highlighted the meeting between Iran’s deputy ambassador in Kabul with the governor of the province and increased Iranian activities in the health sector in that area. In addition, Iran continued to negotiate with the Taliban regime concerning the release of Iranian prisoners in Afghan jails and the issue of water management concerning the Helmand River, which is a central issue to both countries. These events demonstrate the continuing attempts of the Iranian government to develop its ties with the Taliban regime following the handover of the Afghan embassy in Tehran to the Taliban at the end of February. Any developing cooperation between the Taliban regime and Iran would further feed into the destabilization role that Tehran is playing in the region.
Pro-ISIS propaganda outlets also mocked the participation of the Taliban at a regional meeting in Uzbekistan, highlighting that the Taliban were only allowed in after its first official part concluded. On April 13, 2023, the fourth meeting of the foreign ministers of Afghanistan’s neighboring states brought together the top diplomats from China, Iran, Pakistan, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan in Samarkand, Uzbekistan. A Taliban delegation was permitted to attend only part of the meeting. Interestingly, despite the Taliban presence, the official declaration issued at the end of the conference highlighted the continuing regional and global threat posed by a range of terrorist groups operating in Afghanistan, such as ISIS-K, al-Qaeda, and the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) as well as the ongoing illegal drug economy in the country. This indicates that Afghanistan’s neighbors, including governments more open to engaging with the Taliban regime, such as Pakistan, Iran, Russia, and China, also continue to see a terrorism threat emanating from the country that goes beyond ISIS-K and includes al-Qaeda. Unfortunately, despite highlighting the importance of humanitarian assistance to the country, the official declaration did not mention the disruption caused by the Taliban decree banning Afghan women from working for the United Nations in the country.
Following the announcement of this Taliban decision banning Afghan women from U.N. employment, the United Nations decided to send all its Afghan staff home and to review its operations in Afghanistan until May 2023. At the beginning of May, a special meeting on the situation in Afghanistan in Doha, Qatar—chaired by U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres and to which the Taliban were not invited—did not bring any progress on this issue. Indeed, in the runup to the meeting, a statement by U.N. Deputy Secretary General Amina Mohammed caused confusion as she seemed to suggest that official recognition of the Taliban may be the way forward. Mohammed visited Afghanistan in January 2023. During her trip, she had said “some progress” had been made on women’s rights in Afghanistan. This was an obvious misreading of the situation since weeks after her visit, the Taliban enforced their degree banning Afghan women from working for the United Nations.
Unfortunately, the consensus between the various stakeholders within the United Nations to resist the Taliban decree seems to be breaking down. Some U.N. agencies have recalled their Afghan staff to work, despite the continuing Taliban ban on female staff members. Furthermore, according to a leaked email, the United Nations country team decided that all its agencies could now individually decide how to handle the situation. That the United Nations can no longer present a united front against the Taliban regime means that the international stakeholders have relinquished the limited leverage they had vis a vis the Taliban regime. In essence, it seems that some parts of the U.N. structure in Afghanistan are currently beginning to adhere to the decree. This is even more regrettable since, at the beginning of May, U.N. experts reported that increasingly female staff members of the United Nations in Afghanistan were harassed and, in some cases, arrested by the Taliban.
Finally, as expected, Afghanistan’s overall human rights situation continues to deteriorate. Already in November 2022, Taliban leader Haibatullah Akhundzada decreed the reinstatement of harsh punishments in the country. At the beginning of May 2023, a United Nations report highlighted the increasing use of dehumanizing methods of execution, such as burying the condemned under a wall are used in Afghanistan. Pleas by the international community to end such practices continue to be rebuffed by the Taliban regime.
