Afghanistan dispatches: ‘the north of Afghanistan will be very unstable for the Taliban to control’ Dispatches
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Afghanistan dispatches: ‘the north of Afghanistan will be very unstable for the Taliban to control’

JURIST EXCLUSIVE – Law students in Afghanistan are filing reports with JURIST on the situation there after the fall of Kabul to the Taliban on Sunday. Here, a law student in Kabul offers his latest observations and perspective. For privacy and security reasons we are withholding his name and institutional affiliation. The text has been only lightly edited to respect the author’s voice.

Today in Afghanistan a ray of hope shone for the people of Afghanistan amidst this darkness. The Taliban were doing door to door search in people’s houses in a northern district this afternoon when they got into to a conflict with the locals. The fight grew big and the Northern Alliance (NA) forces and the locals defeated the Taliban in a confrontation in the Qasan valley of Andaraab district of Baghlan province. Today it was reported that three districts were retaken from Taliban. There is now a push to fully retake Baghlan province.

Baghlan province is located in the center of the northern parts of Afghanistan, which has routes to Badakhshan and Takhar on the far north of the country. If Baghlan is retaken by the NA, the north of Afghanistan will be very unstable for the Taliban to control. This local revulsion, I dearly hope, will help and encourage other localities and authorities to follow.

On a different note, today the Taliban raided the Indian Consulates in Herat, Kabul, and Kandahar provinces as part of their search for important documents. These searches have made citizens who worked in these Consulates worried for their lives and lives of their loved ones.

The Taliban’s door to door search and vengeful actions in Kabul have been in smaller amounts, as the international press’s eyes there are observing them somewhat. But in the provinces there are numerous reports of the Taliban perusing vengeful actions.  For instance after the people of Khost province – in a small group and without violence – replaced the Taliban’s flag with Afghanistan’s national flag, the Taliban put the whole city in full lockdown,. There are also all sorts of targeting and killings of military officials. This has convinced every single citizen of Afghanistan that Taliban’s words of assurance mean nothing. Recently the Taliban has declared that they will neither decide nor engage in talks with Afghan politicians about the future of Afghanistan until the US troops full withdraw from the Kabul Airport, which raises wary and distress among people about everything from targeted killings to being sanctioned internationally.

With regards to education, the schools and universities have been closed due to Covid 19 throughout the year. Given the situation it now seems that students’ lives will continue interrupted for a long while, as it does not seem that Taliban are interested to hasten the commencement of school and university studies.