Won’t Accept Orders Against Belief, National Interests, Says Taliban’s Defense Minister

The Taliban held a grand meeting with the participation of their officials in Kandahar on Thursday.

According to media reports, around 3,000 tribal elders, religious scholars, and Taliban officials participated in the meeting and discussed the current affairs of Afghanistan.

This was the second largest meeting of the Taliban that has been held so far. Previously, the Taliban held a three-day meeting in Kabul, in which, according to the group, participants pledged allegiance to their leader, Mullah Hibatullah Akhundzada.

In the Kandahar meeting, Taliban officials defended the restrictions which have been imposed in various aspects of life in Afghanistan.

Taliban call the resistance fighters as rebels.

Taliban-affiliated media outlet, Bakhtar News Agency, quoted Ahmadi, as saying, “Three rebels have been killed and one has been wounded in an ambush of security forces in Badakhshan province on Thursday night.”

United Nations and human rights organisations have objected to the killing of civilians by the Taliban in the absence of a fair judiciary system.

On August 18, Amnesty International in a statement said that in the past one year, thousands of Afghans have been arbitrarily arrested, tortured, disappeared or even killed by the Taliban.

Stating that the Taliban have committed gross violations of human rights and conducted revenge killings that have repeatedly occurred, the watchdog group has emphasized on creating a mechanism for effective investigation and accountability in Afghanistan.

Taliban-affiliated Bakhtar News Agency has published parts of the speech attributed to the Taliban leader, but no picture of him at the Kandahar meeting, has been published.

Since the fall of Kabul to the Taliban on August 15, 2021, the person whom the Taliban consider to be their leader has never appeared in public. However, periodically the Taliban publish decrees, news and audio files attributed to Akhundzada.

Bakhtar News Agency has quoted Akhundzada as asking Afghan professionals who have left the country to return "to build airplanes and vehicles inside the country because it will benefit the nation”.

Akhundzada has also said that he has “issued a decree to take care of child beggars”. “If a child of this country remains uneducated, the responsibility will return to me,” the Taliban leader has stressed. He said that he has asked Taliban officials to admit children begging on the streets to schools.” However, the Taliban leader still has not spoken about providing secondary education for girls in Afghanistan.

It has been more than 335 days since the Taliban prevented the reopening of girls' schools in Afghanistan.

The educational system in Afghanistan has suffered dramatically in the past two years as a result of COVID-19 and the Taliban reign of the country.

On Thursday, the Taliban held a meeting in Kandahar with the presence of the group's officials. In a resolution issued at the end of the Kandahar meeting, the Taliban condemned the US airstrike in Sherpur area of Kabul, which led to the killing of Ayman al-Zawahiri, the al-Qaeda leader.

In this resolution, it has also been mentioned that any neighbouring country of Afghanistan that has allowed the American drone to fly in its space is also a partner in this "crime".

The UN office in Kabul revealed the figure of casualties following an explosion at a mosque in district 11 of Kabul on August 17.

According to the Taliban, 21 people had been killed and 23 others had been injured because of the Wednesday evening explosion at the mosque in Kabul. Some sources reported an even higher number of casualties.

UNAMA has also expressed its sympathy to the families of the victims and stressed that many civilians were killed and injured in the attack.

The UN agency did not provide further details about the exact number of casualties in Wednesday's attack.

With the security situation deteriorating in Afghanistan, UNAMA urged the Taliban authorities to take concrete steps to prevent all forms of terrorism in Afghanistan.

UNAMA has said that the Taliban should provide additional support to vulnerable communities in Afghanistan.

Despite the large-scale attacks and the increase in the number of civilian casualties, Taliban officials claim that Afghanistan is safe and the group is in control of the security situation of the country.

On Thursday, the Taliban announced that a major gathering of the group has kicked off in southern Kandahar province.

According to the Taliban, more than 3,000 tribal elders, religious scholars, and Taliban officials participated in the meeting.

The Taliban foreign minister announced at the Kandahar meeting that the group is working on formulating a foreign policy and claimed that they have reached important achievements in foreign affairs.

Muttaqi once again emphasised that the Taliban seeks good relations with the world and urged the international community to allow Afghans to live a prosperous life.

Muttaqi claimed that the Taliban took control of Afghanistan in eleven days with the support of the people and stressed that it shows the popular legitimacy of the group.

According to the Taliban officials, the Kandahar gathering is being held to discuss the current situation of Afghanistan.