KABUL (Pajhwok): Last week, the United Nations (UN) said that Participants the Doha meeting agreed on the need for a strategy of engagement with the incumebent Afghan authoraties whiel China stressed over increased international community interaction with the ‘Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan’ (IEA).
Last week’s major developments
- Participants of Doha meeting agreed on the need for a strategy of engagement that allows for the stabilization of Afghanistan but also allows for addressing important concerns: António Guterres
- Doha meeting participants agreed supply of life-saving aid to Afghanistan: West
- Curbs on media outlets in Afghanistan increased: UNAMA
- We support and back media: Mujahid
- World should talk and interact with acting Afghan government: China
- Will continue our operation in Afghanistan: UN
Casualties:
Last week, eight people were killed and eight others injured in different incidents of violence nationwide
One robber was killed and seven arrested by security forces in the 16th police district of capital Kabul when they wanted to rob a house. Separately report showed that a youth killed a youth after verbal clash and injured his brother.
Reports showed that unknown militnats have killed a tribal elder in Logar, a boy body recovered in Ghazni while a girl body recovered in Urzgan provinces.
In Nangarhar, seven people were injured in a clash on land while a man was killed in similar dispute in Logar province.
A tractor struck a landmine in Logar which killed the tractor driver.
Note: These figures are based on reports reaching Pajhwok Afghan News. Some incidents might have gone unreported or sources provided incorrect figures.
According to reports the previous week 13 people were killed and 11 others injured in different violent incidents nationwide.
Before the regime change in August 2021, hundreds of civilians, insurgents and government forces would be killed and wounded every week.
UN Doha meeting on Afghanistan:
Last week UN held a global meeting of 22 special representatives and two international organisations on Afghanistan in Doha.
UN Secretary General António Guterres said they had agreed on the need for a “strategy of engagement” with the Taliban, to help the country’s most vulnerable people.
“Mr. Guterres made clear that the gathering had not focussed on recognition of the de facto authorities, but rather on developing a common, international approach to burning interlinked issues, such as terrorism, the crackdown on human rights, and the spread of drug trafficking,” he said.
Guterres did not provide more detail about the staretgy but added similar meeting would be convened again soon.
US Special Representative for Afghanistan Thomas West on his Twitter handle wrote: “UN has made clear, this meeting was not about recognition. Focus was identifying shared interests and how we collectively advance them: on terrorism, repression of women & girls, devastating humanitarian crisis, and narcotics outflows, among others.”
Zabihullah Mujahid, spokesperson of the acting government, said that government desired interaction with the world and asked the international community to invit the acting government representative as well to such meetings.
A head of the Doha meeting Afghanistan’s Civil Society Organizations have demanded their participation in the upcoming Doha meeting and any negotiations with the de facto Afghan authorities.
A number of civil society organisations in an open letter to the UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres demanded that a roadmap to recognize the incumbent Afghan government should include Afghan actors from diverse backgrounds.
Acting Afghan government was not invited to the Doha meeting but the IEA political office head in Qatar Sohail Shaheen met Chinese and British envoys in Doha on the eve of the UN-led international conference on Afghanistan.
Shaheen twitted that he met Chinese special representative for Afghanistan ambassador Yue Xiaoyongy and discussed with him various issues including the economy of Afghanistan.
They talked about the current situation of Afghanistan, interaction and some other matters about regional connectivity.
Shaheen also met Andrew McQueary, the director of Britain’sco-operation and development office. Both sides discussed the current situation of Afghanistan and the ongoing UN-led meeting about Afghanistan.
SCO meeting:
Pakistan Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari on Friday said a peaceful and stable Afghanistan was a key not only to regional integration and economic cooperation but also to global peace and stability.
In his keynote address to the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation’s (SCO) Council of Foreign Ministers (CFM) in Goa, India, Bilawal said the situation in Afghanistan presented new challenges as well as opportunities.
“We continue to call the international community to meaningfully engage with the Interim Afghan Government to better understand and influence the course of events”
India External Affairs Minister J. Shankar said that the formation of an inclusive government in Afghanistan, fight against terrorism and the rights of girls and women remained top piroirity concerns of the SCO.
But Shaheen said that matters related to the recognition of the Afghan government and resolution of existing crises should be discussed in every international ad regional forums.
Ahmad Zia Taka, assistant spokesperson of the IEA, said that besides Afghanistan’s economic, security and political issues matters related to counter-terrorism and drug trafficking were discussed in the Collective Securrity Treaty Organisation meeting (CSTO).
World Press Freedom Day:
On the World Press Freedom Day — May 3 — UN expressed concern over the future of medi and journalists in Afghanistan and added curbs on media outlets had increased by the acting government and journalist were forced to work in the environment of fear and threat.
The acting government spokesperson Zabihullah Muhjahid said: “The value of the press in any country is not hidden from anyone and efforts should be made to strengthen it,” Mujahid told Pajhwok Afghan News during an exclusive chat.
May 3 marks the 30th anniversary of World Press Freedom Day, proclaimed by the UN General Assembly in 1993.
Mujahid said impartial media was key to a society’s development as it conveyed the people’s voice to the government and communicated government’s activities to the masses.
The Ministry of Information and Cultual Affairs said that government was committed to the freedom of press in line with the Islamic and national values, adding that IEA did not introduced a new media policy as yet.
Free Media Support Organization (NAI) said that after regime change in Afghanistan more than half of the media outlets stopped functioning due to financial crisis.
Interraction with Afghan government:
Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Mao Ning’s said that world should increase interaction with the acting Afghan government and encouraged the currnet Afghan authorities to form an inclusive government and maintaine cordial ties with its neighbours.
Former Afghan President Hamid Karzai has held a meeting with the EU Special Representative for Afghanistan Tomos Niklasson and stressed over the reopening of schools and reversal of orders to ban women from work and universities. They termed talks vital for durable peace in Afghanistan.
Iran and India have expressed concrns over deteriorated humanitarian and economic situation in Afghanistan and announced support to the formation of an inclusive government.
INGOs operation in Afghanistan:
United Nations’ chief Antonio Guterres slammed the Afghan caretaker government’s “unprecedented” curbs on Afghan women’s rights.
He stated “to achieve our objectives, we cannot disengage” with the Taliban and said “it is difficult to overestimate the gravity of the situation” in the country.
He noted that 97% of the population lived in poverty and that donor funding was drying up.
Guterres emphasized that the current ban on local women working for the United Nations in Afghanistan was unacceptable “and puts lives in jeopardy”.
“We will never be silent in the face of unprecedented and systemic attacks on women and girls’ rights,” said Guterres.
A senior UNHCR official who arreived in Kabul last week said that UNHCR will continue its operation in Afghanistan and talk to the acting authroities regarding women work and education in the country.
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