Six months since the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, a humanitarian crisis has developed that has devastated the lives of children across the country, say Save the Children.
The NGO says its newly released pictures tell the story of children fighting for survival, as families make impossible decisions about which child they can afford to feed and which children need to work on the streets to put food on the table.
The pictures -- by photographer Jim Huylebroek -- form part of a series called Children on the Edge of Life and give a glimpse into Afghanistan’s worst food crisis since records began. Almost five million children stand on the brink of starvation due to the devastation caused by the conflict and subsequent economic collapse in Afghanistan, says the NGO. The situation has been made even worse by drought.
Read more at:
Afghanistan crisis: Pictures show children's fight for survival six months since Taliban takeover | Euronews
Showing posts with label Afghanistan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Afghanistan. Show all posts
2/20/22
1/26/22
Norway - Afghanistan relations: Norway hosts Taliban for meetings about pending humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan
Representatives of the Taliban arrive in Gardermoen, Norway, on Saturday for talks on alleviating a humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan. They'll meet with representatives of the Norwegian authorities and several allied countries but also with civil society activists and human rights defenders from Afghanistan. (Terje Bendiksby/NTB Scanpix/The Associated Press)
A Taliban delegation has arrived in Norway for talks with the Norwegian government and several allied countries on alleviating a humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan, as well as for meetings with civil society activists and human rights defenders from the country.
Read more at: Norway hosts Taliban for meetings about pending humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan | CBC News
A Taliban delegation has arrived in Norway for talks with the Norwegian government and several allied countries on alleviating a humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan, as well as for meetings with civil society activists and human rights defenders from the country.
Read more at: Norway hosts Taliban for meetings about pending humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan | CBC News
1/11/22
China-Afghanistan relations: Too big to fail: China eyes Afghanistan investment amid fears of state collapse
Pakistan -- Since rolling into Kabul in August and cementing control over the rest of Afghanistan, the Taliban have been in a frenetic round of diplomatic talks to end the country's economic and
U.S. and Western sanctions have destroyed the economy, which, combined with a drought, has plungeparts of the country into near starvation in the midst of winter. The Taliban have placed their hopes of salvation on Pakistan, which has supported the movement since its origin in the 1990s, and on China, which has long-standing ties to Pakistan and an ambiguous, transactional relationship with whichever government reigns in Kabul.
Beijing has so far refused to recognize the Taliban government, known as the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, though semi-secret negotiations continue via its embassy in Kabul. In August, following the Taliban takeover, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said it was "willing to continue to develop ... friendly and cooperative relations with Afghanistan." In September, China pledged a modest $31 million in food, medicine, COVID-19 vaccines and other aid. About half has been disbursed, according to the ministry of refugees in Kabul. Pakistan has pledged $28 million. Bilal Karimi, a Taliban spokesman at the ministry of information, enigmatically described China's relations with the new Islamic Emirate as "mysterious," referring to the close but secretive discussions that are going on between Chinese officials and the IEA via Beijing's Kabul embassy, with recognition being one of the key issues.
Read more at: Too big to fail: China eyes Afghanistan investment amid fears of state collapse - Nikkei Asia
U.S. and Western sanctions have destroyed the economy, which, combined with a drought, has plungeparts of the country into near starvation in the midst of winter. The Taliban have placed their hopes of salvation on Pakistan, which has supported the movement since its origin in the 1990s, and on China, which has long-standing ties to Pakistan and an ambiguous, transactional relationship with whichever government reigns in Kabul.
Beijing has so far refused to recognize the Taliban government, known as the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, though semi-secret negotiations continue via its embassy in Kabul. In August, following the Taliban takeover, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said it was "willing to continue to develop ... friendly and cooperative relations with Afghanistan." In September, China pledged a modest $31 million in food, medicine, COVID-19 vaccines and other aid. About half has been disbursed, according to the ministry of refugees in Kabul. Pakistan has pledged $28 million. Bilal Karimi, a Taliban spokesman at the ministry of information, enigmatically described China's relations with the new Islamic Emirate as "mysterious," referring to the close but secretive discussions that are going on between Chinese officials and the IEA via Beijing's Kabul embassy, with recognition being one of the key issues.
Read more at: Too big to fail: China eyes Afghanistan investment amid fears of state collapse - Nikkei Asia
11/16/21
The Afghanistan DISASTER: Once and Future Defeat in Afghanistan - War on the Rocks - by Barnett Rubin
“Everyone is failing us.” These were the first words that Ashraf Ghani uttered — not as he fled the advancing Taliban on Aug. 15, 2021, but in March 2002 as we sat down to dinner on a chilly and wet night on my first post-9/11 visit to Kabul. I had known him since 1984, first as an academic colleague and then as a World Bank official. We had collaborated as informal advisors to U.N. envoy Lakhdar Brahimi during his first assignment from 1997 to 1999, and then as part of the United Nations team in 2001, when the two of us served as Brahimi’s advisors during the Bonn Conference that set the framework for the post-Taliban government.
Soon after, Ghani had left for Kabul, where he established the Afghanistan Aid Coordination Agency, which he said would align international aid with Afghan priorities. Over dinner, he described how the Bush administration had allocated no new money for rebuilding the country, which was then devastated by (a mere!) 24 years of war. International agencies had presented gross underestimates of reconstruction costs, and their uncoordinated operations were marginalizing the destitute government. The U.N. political mission was virtually alone in pressing for the broadening of the interim administration at the upcoming Emergency Loya Jirga. Ghani became finance minister at that jirga three months later and ultimately president in 2014, only to discover that the policies that he prescribed in his book, Fixing Failed States, ignored political realities in both Afghanistan and America. Even after the United States signed a February 2020 deal with the Taliban, promising to leave by May 1, 2021, he refused to believe in or plan for the withdrawal of U.S. forces. As late as Aug. 2, 2021, he boasted to the Afghan parliament that he would get the situation “under control” in six months.
Read more at: The Once and Future Defeat in Afghanistan - War on the Rocks
Soon after, Ghani had left for Kabul, where he established the Afghanistan Aid Coordination Agency, which he said would align international aid with Afghan priorities. Over dinner, he described how the Bush administration had allocated no new money for rebuilding the country, which was then devastated by (a mere!) 24 years of war. International agencies had presented gross underestimates of reconstruction costs, and their uncoordinated operations were marginalizing the destitute government. The U.N. political mission was virtually alone in pressing for the broadening of the interim administration at the upcoming Emergency Loya Jirga. Ghani became finance minister at that jirga three months later and ultimately president in 2014, only to discover that the policies that he prescribed in his book, Fixing Failed States, ignored political realities in both Afghanistan and America. Even after the United States signed a February 2020 deal with the Taliban, promising to leave by May 1, 2021, he refused to believe in or plan for the withdrawal of U.S. forces. As late as Aug. 2, 2021, he boasted to the Afghan parliament that he would get the situation “under control” in six months.
Read more at: The Once and Future Defeat in Afghanistan - War on the Rocks
10/26/21
NATO: Afghanistan: two decades of Nato help leaves a failed and fractured state on the brink of civil war
Afghanistan is falling apart. With US and Nato troops leaving the country earlier than planned, experts are warning that the Taliban could take control of the country within six months. Currently the insurgents control the strategically important province of Helmand, and control or contest territory nearly every province in the war-torn country.
As many as 188 of Afghanistan’s 407 districts are directly under Taliban rule. With up to 85,000 full-time fighters), the insurgents have already forced thousands of troops belonging to the US-trained Afghan army to surrender or flee.
In response to the Taliban’s onslaught, local militias are fighting back. Most notable among them is a coalition of militias in northern Afghanistan called the Second Resistance, led by Ahmad Massoud (the son of Northern Alliance commander Ahmad Shah Massoud, who was assassinated in September 2001).
The Second Resistance has several thousand fighters and militia commanders who have fought against the Taliban, mostly of Tajik origin. Massoud insists that the Taliban will not have the same success in fighting his coalition due to far greater resolve of his soldiers compared to the Afghan military. But henceforth he will have to operate without the help of Nato troops.
Read More at: Afghanistan: two decades of Nato help leaves a failed and fractured state on the brink of civil war
As many as 188 of Afghanistan’s 407 districts are directly under Taliban rule. With up to 85,000 full-time fighters), the insurgents have already forced thousands of troops belonging to the US-trained Afghan army to surrender or flee.
In response to the Taliban’s onslaught, local militias are fighting back. Most notable among them is a coalition of militias in northern Afghanistan called the Second Resistance, led by Ahmad Massoud (the son of Northern Alliance commander Ahmad Shah Massoud, who was assassinated in September 2001).
The Second Resistance has several thousand fighters and militia commanders who have fought against the Taliban, mostly of Tajik origin. Massoud insists that the Taliban will not have the same success in fighting his coalition due to far greater resolve of his soldiers compared to the Afghan military. But henceforth he will have to operate without the help of Nato troops.
Read More at: Afghanistan: two decades of Nato help leaves a failed and fractured state on the brink of civil war
10/18/21
EU: Three lessons for Europe from the fall of Afghanistan - by Jean-Marie Guéhenno
Europeans were never serious about Afghanistan. This is probably because, deep down, they knew that the buck did not stop with them. It now seems likely that the Taliban’s takeover of the country will make Europeans even more inward-looking and fearful of a world they do not understand. And the rapidly emerging consensus that state-building is impossible may heighten their anxiety about foreign engagements.
That mindset is an acid that destroys the bonds that should tie Europeans together, leading to the kinds of xenophobic attitudes that were in evidence during the migration crisis created by the Syrian war. As refugees fled the violence in Syria, Europeans were confronted with an unpalatable choice between building ever higher walls, cutting unsavoury deals with so-called buffer countries, or losing control of migration flows. Yet there is only a small distance between accepting that some people cannot be helped and thinking that they are not worth helping. The self-confidence of Europe – which is essential if it is to actively shape its own future – has been damaged by not just its weak operational capacities but, even more so, the ethical crisis of a continent that claims to be universalist but reserves that universalism for its privileged tribes.
Read more at: Three lessons for Europe from the fall of Afghanistan – European Council on Foreign Relations
That mindset is an acid that destroys the bonds that should tie Europeans together, leading to the kinds of xenophobic attitudes that were in evidence during the migration crisis created by the Syrian war. As refugees fled the violence in Syria, Europeans were confronted with an unpalatable choice between building ever higher walls, cutting unsavoury deals with so-called buffer countries, or losing control of migration flows. Yet there is only a small distance between accepting that some people cannot be helped and thinking that they are not worth helping. The self-confidence of Europe – which is essential if it is to actively shape its own future – has been damaged by not just its weak operational capacities but, even more so, the ethical crisis of a continent that claims to be universalist but reserves that universalism for its privileged tribes.
Read more at: Three lessons for Europe from the fall of Afghanistan – European Council on Foreign Relations
9/13/21
Afghanistan's universities now officially segregated by sex
Women in Afghanistan will be allowed to study in universities as the country seeks to rebuild after decades of war — but segregation by sex and a dress code will be mandatory, the Taliban's new higher education minister said on Sunday.
The minister, Abdul Baqi Haqqani, said the new Taliban government, named last week, would "start building the country on what exists today" and did not want to turn the clock back 20 years to when the movement was last in power.
He said female students would be taught by women wherever possible and classrooms would remain separated, in accordance with the movement's interpretation of Shariah law.
"Thanks to God we have a high number of women teachers. We will not face any problems in this. All efforts will be made to find and provide women teachers for female students," he told a news conference in Kabul.
Note EU-Digets: This is not unique for Afghanistan. Many Muslim countries who practice Sharia Law, including Saudi Arabia, a close ally of the US and many Western countries, which sell them billions of Dollars and Euros of weapons, have segragated places of learning.
Read more at: Afghanistan's universities now officially segregated by sex | CBC News
The minister, Abdul Baqi Haqqani, said the new Taliban government, named last week, would "start building the country on what exists today" and did not want to turn the clock back 20 years to when the movement was last in power.
He said female students would be taught by women wherever possible and classrooms would remain separated, in accordance with the movement's interpretation of Shariah law.
"Thanks to God we have a high number of women teachers. We will not face any problems in this. All efforts will be made to find and provide women teachers for female students," he told a news conference in Kabul.
Note EU-Digets: This is not unique for Afghanistan. Many Muslim countries who practice Sharia Law, including Saudi Arabia, a close ally of the US and many Western countries, which sell them billions of Dollars and Euros of weapons, have segragated places of learning.
Read more at: Afghanistan's universities now officially segregated by sex | CBC News
9/10/21
Afghanistan: EU blasts new Taliban-formed government as neither 'inclusive nor representative'
The European Union on Wednesday criticised the interim government formed by the Taliban in Afghanistan as neither "inclusive" nor "representative" of the country's ethnic and religious diversity.
"It does not look like the inclusive and representative formation of Afghanistan's rich ethnic and religious diversity that we had hoped to see and that the Taliban promised in recent weeks," an EU spokesman said in a statement.
Key positions in Afghanistan's new caretaker government were announced by the Taliban on Tuesday evening. The cabinet is all-male and stacked with prominent Taliban fighters who already helmed key posts during the militant group's hardline regime between 1996 and 2001.
Read more at: EU blasts new Taliban-formed government as neither 'inclusive nor representative' | Euronews
"It does not look like the inclusive and representative formation of Afghanistan's rich ethnic and religious diversity that we had hoped to see and that the Taliban promised in recent weeks," an EU spokesman said in a statement.
Key positions in Afghanistan's new caretaker government were announced by the Taliban on Tuesday evening. The cabinet is all-male and stacked with prominent Taliban fighters who already helmed key posts during the militant group's hardline regime between 1996 and 2001.
Read more at: EU blasts new Taliban-formed government as neither 'inclusive nor representative' | Euronews
9/1/21
Afghanistan: Germany hints at reopening Kabul embassy
German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas has said a German Embassy could reopen — under certain conditions. Elsewhere, India has, for the first time, held talks with the Taliban.
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Read more at: Afghanistan: Germany hints at reopening Kabul embassy — live updates | News | DW | 01.09.2021
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Read more at: Afghanistan: Germany hints at reopening Kabul embassy — live updates | News | DW | 01.09.2021
8/28/21
Afghanistan: Biden promises more strikes against ISIL-affiliate in Afghanistan
United States President Joe Biden has promised further strikes against the ISIL (ISIS) group’s affiliate in Afghanistan in retaliation for a deadly suicide bombing on Thursday outside Kabul airport and warned that the situation on the ground continued to be “extremely dangerous” with another attack “highly likely” in the coming hours.
“This strike was not the last. We will continue to hunt down any person involved in that heinous attack and make them pay,” Biden said in a statement on Saturday.
Read more at: Biden promises more strikes against ISIL-affiliate in Afghanistan | Drone Strikes News | Al Jazeera
“This strike was not the last. We will continue to hunt down any person involved in that heinous attack and make them pay,” Biden said in a statement on Saturday.
Read more at: Biden promises more strikes against ISIL-affiliate in Afghanistan | Drone Strikes News | Al Jazeera
8/26/21
The Netherlands: Dutch military pulled 2,500 people from Kabul including final evacuation flight Thursday
The Dutch military evacuated more than 2,500 people from Afghanistan in the past week, including more than 1,600 people with the Netherlands as their destination. The Cabinet reported this in a letter to Parliament about the evacuation mission which ended on Thursday with a final flight from Kabul to Islamabad in which remaining Dutch diplomats and soldiers were on board.
"It is terrible to have to leave Afghanistan after 20 years in this way," tweeted caretaker Foreign Minister Sigrid Kaag. "It is with a heavy heart that the embassy team and the military have left with the last Dutch flight."
Among the evacuees are Dutch nationals, interpreters and their families and people who have worked in the Dutch service in the past and may therefore be at risk now that the Taliban have seized power in the country. The government cannot yet state exact numbers per group.
Read more at: Dutch military pulled 2,500 people from Kabul including final evacuation flight Thursday | NL Times
"It is terrible to have to leave Afghanistan after 20 years in this way," tweeted caretaker Foreign Minister Sigrid Kaag. "It is with a heavy heart that the embassy team and the military have left with the last Dutch flight."
Among the evacuees are Dutch nationals, interpreters and their families and people who have worked in the Dutch service in the past and may therefore be at risk now that the Taliban have seized power in the country. The government cannot yet state exact numbers per group.
Read more at: Dutch military pulled 2,500 people from Kabul including final evacuation flight Thursday | NL Times
USA: Biden's Hypocritical Afghanistan Critics Prove Ignorant About Afghan History
After years of ignoring it, pundits and reporters have rediscovered Afghanistan. They rend garments and tear hair over the immediate disaster, while preparing to spend months obsessing over what everyone expects to be coming horrors. They're openly advocating for a continuation of the longest war in American history, and never mind that the war was so successful that the government it supported collapsed before the last American troops had even pulled out. What they don't do is explain where they've been for the last decade and why they only seem to care now. What they don't do is provide historical context. With notable exceptions, what they don't do is ask the most basic of questions, and not only because to do so would expose their complicity in and ignorance of how it all came to this, rather it's primarily because having the attention spans of gnats they don't even know what questions to ask.
Afghanistan is not Joe Biden's fault. The anticipated coming horrors are not Joe Biden's fault. Former President George W. Bush recently criticized the pullout of American troops from Afghanistan, which breaks the scales of hypocrisy, given that it was his disastrous failures that ensured the war was unwinnable, after his administration's disastrous failures enabled the worst ever terrorist attack on U.S. soil, which triggered the war in the first place. The Washington Post editorial board recently criticized the pullout, but the Washington Post editorial board helped cheerlead and lie the U.S. into the illegal and immoral Iraq War, which ensured that the effort in Afghanistan would disastrously fail.
Read more at: Biden's Hypocritical Afghanistan Critics Prove Ignorant About Afghan History | Crooks and Liars
Afghanistan is not Joe Biden's fault. The anticipated coming horrors are not Joe Biden's fault. Former President George W. Bush recently criticized the pullout of American troops from Afghanistan, which breaks the scales of hypocrisy, given that it was his disastrous failures that ensured the war was unwinnable, after his administration's disastrous failures enabled the worst ever terrorist attack on U.S. soil, which triggered the war in the first place. The Washington Post editorial board recently criticized the pullout, but the Washington Post editorial board helped cheerlead and lie the U.S. into the illegal and immoral Iraq War, which ensured that the effort in Afghanistan would disastrously fail.
Read more at: Biden's Hypocritical Afghanistan Critics Prove Ignorant About Afghan History | Crooks and Liars
Afghanistan: Dozens of civilians, 12 U.S. troops killed in Kabul airport attack
Islamic State struck the crowded gates of Kabul airport in a suicide bomb attack on Thursday, killing scores of civilians and 12 U.S. troops, and throwing into mayhem the airlift of tens of thousands of Afghans desperate to flee.
Kabul health officials were quoted as saying 60 civilians were killed. Video shot by Afghan journalists showed dozens of bodies strewn around a canal on the edge of the airport. At least two blasts roc
Read more at: Dozens of civilians, 12 U.S. troops killed in Kabul airport attack | Reuters
Kabul health officials were quoted as saying 60 civilians were killed. Video shot by Afghan journalists showed dozens of bodies strewn around a canal on the edge of the airport. At least two blasts roc
Read more at: Dozens of civilians, 12 U.S. troops killed in Kabul airport attack | Reuters
8/25/21
EU:-US relations: Disbelief and betrayal: Europe reacts to Biden’s Afghanistan ‘miscalculation’
ow, the American president’s decision to allow Afghanistan to collapse into the arms of the Taliban has European officials worried he has unwittingly accelerated what his predecessor Donald Trump started: the degradation of the Western alliance and everything it is supposed to stand for in the world.
Across Europe, officials have reacted with a mix of disbelief and a sense of betrayal. Even those who cheered Biden’s election and believed he could ease the recent tensions in the transatlantic relationship said they regarded the withdrawal from Afghanistan as nothing short of a mistake of historic magnitude.
Read moe at: Disbelief and betrayal: Europe reacts to Biden’s Afghanistan ‘miscalculation’ – POLITICO
Across Europe, officials have reacted with a mix of disbelief and a sense of betrayal. Even those who cheered Biden’s election and believed he could ease the recent tensions in the transatlantic relationship said they regarded the withdrawal from Afghanistan as nothing short of a mistake of historic magnitude.
Read moe at: Disbelief and betrayal: Europe reacts to Biden’s Afghanistan ‘miscalculation’ – POLITICO
8/23/21
Afghanistan: Taliban says any attempt to extend foreign troops evacuation deadline beyond August 31 is clear violation
A Taliban spokesperson has dismissed the UK’s call to extend the August 31 deadline for completing the evacuation underway at Kabul airport, saying any attempt by foreign troops to remain in the country would be a clear violation.
Speaking to British media, UK Armed Forces Minister James Heappey stated that Britain is seeking to convince America to remain on the ground longer, ensuring the security of the evacuation process, as well as calling on the Taliban to extend the initial August 31 deadline for the withdrawal of foreign forces.
Taliban spokesperson Muhammad Suhail Shaheen rejected the UK’s request for an extension on Monday, telling the BBC that foreign troops must exit the country by the originally agreed date or otherwise be in clear violation of the deal reached with the militant group.
Read more at: Taliban says any attempt to extend foreign troops evacuation deadline beyond August 31 is clear violation — RT World News
Speaking to British media, UK Armed Forces Minister James Heappey stated that Britain is seeking to convince America to remain on the ground longer, ensuring the security of the evacuation process, as well as calling on the Taliban to extend the initial August 31 deadline for the withdrawal of foreign forces.
Taliban spokesperson Muhammad Suhail Shaheen rejected the UK’s request for an extension on Monday, telling the BBC that foreign troops must exit the country by the originally agreed date or otherwise be in clear violation of the deal reached with the militant group.
Read more at: Taliban says any attempt to extend foreign troops evacuation deadline beyond August 31 is clear violation — RT World News
8/22/21
Afghanistan: Trump’s Deal With the Taliban: Why Is Biden Being Blamed?
There are people who are of the opinion that Biden has mishandled the situation in Afghanistan, and that his choice to withdraw the troops is a betrayal of both our allies and our troop’s sacrifices over the last twenty years. What is receiving far less press is the fact that Biden’s decision was based on a deal that Trump cut with the Taliban.
Read more at: Trump’s Deal With the Taliban: Why Is Biden Being Blamed? | Muslim Girl
Read more at: Trump’s Deal With the Taliban: Why Is Biden Being Blamed? | Muslim Girl
Afghanistan: Taliban′s newly ′moderate′ claims fade in face of harsh reality
While Taliban officials insisted in press conferences and statements to media outlets that they will hold members of the militant group accountable for their actions and investigate reports of reprisals, evidence of violence and atrocities carried out by the group continued to emerge Saturday.
The Taliban said it is preparing to form a new government and will roll out those plans in the coming weeks. The earliest days of the group's return to the capital of Kabul have left many worried that even as the Taliban tries to strike a conciliatory tone, the group's actions belie the same ruthless barbarism that defined its time in power from 1999 to 2001.
Read more at: Afghanistan: Taliban′s newly ′moderate′ claims fade in face of harsh reality | News | DW | 21.08.2021
The Taliban said it is preparing to form a new government and will roll out those plans in the coming weeks. The earliest days of the group's return to the capital of Kabul have left many worried that even as the Taliban tries to strike a conciliatory tone, the group's actions belie the same ruthless barbarism that defined its time in power from 1999 to 2001.
Read more at: Afghanistan: Taliban′s newly ′moderate′ claims fade in face of harsh reality | News | DW | 21.08.2021
8/21/21
EU:Three lessons for Europe from the fall of Afghanistan - by Jean-Marie Guéhenno
Europe needs to take a hard look at what worked and what did not work in Afghanistan. Only then can it gradually and realistically build up its own capacities, rather than aim for grandiose schemes that lack public support.
Europeans were never serious about Afghanistan.
This is probably because, deep down, they knew that the buck did not stop with them. It now seems likely that the Taliban’s takeover of the country will make Europeans even more inward-looking and fearful of a world they do not understand. And the rapidly emerging consensus that state-building is impossible may heighten their anxiety about foreign engagements.
That mindset is an acid that destroys the bonds that should tie Europeans together, leading to the kinds of xenophobic attitudes that were in evidence during the migration crisis created by the Syrian war. As refugees fled the violence in Syria, Europeans were confronted with an unpalatable choice between building ever higher walls, cutting unsavoury deals with so-called buffer countries, or losing control of migration flows. Yet there is only a small distance between accepting that some people cannot be helped and thinking that they are not worth helping. The self-confidence of Europe – which is essential if it is to actively shape its own future – has been damaged by not just its weak operational capacities but, even more so, the ethical crisis of a continent that claims to be universalist but reserves that universalism for its privileged tribes.
Read more at: Three lessons for Europe from the fall of Afghanistan – European Council on Foreign Relations
Europeans were never serious about Afghanistan.
This is probably because, deep down, they knew that the buck did not stop with them. It now seems likely that the Taliban’s takeover of the country will make Europeans even more inward-looking and fearful of a world they do not understand. And the rapidly emerging consensus that state-building is impossible may heighten their anxiety about foreign engagements.
That mindset is an acid that destroys the bonds that should tie Europeans together, leading to the kinds of xenophobic attitudes that were in evidence during the migration crisis created by the Syrian war. As refugees fled the violence in Syria, Europeans were confronted with an unpalatable choice between building ever higher walls, cutting unsavoury deals with so-called buffer countries, or losing control of migration flows. Yet there is only a small distance between accepting that some people cannot be helped and thinking that they are not worth helping. The self-confidence of Europe – which is essential if it is to actively shape its own future – has been damaged by not just its weak operational capacities but, even more so, the ethical crisis of a continent that claims to be universalist but reserves that universalism for its privileged tribes.
Read more at: Three lessons for Europe from the fall of Afghanistan – European Council on Foreign Relations
8/20/21
NATO: Czech President: NATO legitimacy in question after Afghanistan failure
Czech Republic: NATO's legitimacy has been placed in question after its failure in Afghanistan, said Czech President Milos Zeman, stressing that his country will focus on national defense, rather than "wasting money" on the alliance.
NATO's main role is to combat international terrorism, but it has also failed at this task, added Zeman, who is considered pro-Russia and pro-China.
Note EU-Digest: Manny EU members, however, are of the opinion that the Nato has outlived its purpose after the cold war ended , and has now become a US tool to fight its battles around the world
Read more at: Czech President: NATO legitimacy in question after Afghanistan failure
NATO's main role is to combat international terrorism, but it has also failed at this task, added Zeman, who is considered pro-Russia and pro-China.
Note EU-Digest: Manny EU members, however, are of the opinion that the Nato has outlived its purpose after the cold war ended , and has now become a US tool to fight its battles around the world
Read more at: Czech President: NATO legitimacy in question after Afghanistan failure
US NATION BUI;DING POLICY IN DEEP TROUBLE ; Yes, the Taliban’s extreme, but I secretly welcome this defeat of the US ideology of globalism, liberalism and consumerism - -By Brett Sinclair
Around the world, the reaction to the US withdrawal is similarly unsympathetic (as it was to the initial invasion), and both Russia and China have stepped in to offer tentative ties to the newly liberated nation of Afghanistan.
However, how can a Westerner like me feel sympathy for the Taliban? Believe it or not, there are many who view the recent dramatic turn of events with an observer's dark joy. Those who are tired of seeing their own culture and religion eroded from within, and who feel a kind of secret relief at seeing someone successfully resist globalism, feminism, LGBTQ+ and critical race theory (CRT) ideology. They can see that their society has been turned into something dark by a manufactured value-system, promulgated by political elites and the money-power behind them.
Read complete report at : : Yes, the Taliban’s extreme, but I secretly welcome this defeat of the US ideology of globalism, liberalism and consumerism — RT Op-ed
However, how can a Westerner like me feel sympathy for the Taliban? Believe it or not, there are many who view the recent dramatic turn of events with an observer's dark joy. Those who are tired of seeing their own culture and religion eroded from within, and who feel a kind of secret relief at seeing someone successfully resist globalism, feminism, LGBTQ+ and critical race theory (CRT) ideology. They can see that their society has been turned into something dark by a manufactured value-system, promulgated by political elites and the money-power behind them.
Read complete report at : : Yes, the Taliban’s extreme, but I secretly welcome this defeat of the US ideology of globalism, liberalism and consumerism — RT Op-ed
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