Akhundzada Orders Taliban’s Supreme Court To Ban Facebook in Afghanistan

Rafiullah Samim, the Taliban’s provincial director of information and culture, issued the warning to the local media outlets in Logar on Sunday during a meeting with journalists.

The meeting with journalists was attended by Rafiullah Samim, Hematullah Mohajer, the spokesperson of the group's provincial intelligence directorate, and Ikramullah spokesperson of the provincial directorate of promotion virtue and prevention of vice.

Media executives and journalists of Logar media outlets told Afghanistan International that these Taliban officials asked them to not broadcast women’s voices anymore.

According to our sources, when the media officials and journalists asked why women’s voices shouldn't be broadcast in Logar while it is being broadcast in Kabul, the Taliban officials argued that "the environment in Logar is different from Kabul".

Sources added that Taliban officials forced these media executives and journalists to sign a letter that if they continue to broadcast women’s voices, they will be severely punished.

However, the Taliban officials in Kabul and media support groups have not reacted to the Taliban’s latest restrictions on media in Logar province.

In recent months, Pakistan has detained thousands of Afghan refugees and deported some of them to Afghanistan.

Earlier, a Taliban border official said that Pakistan has allowed Afghan refugees to cross the borders of the two countries without holding passports, and only with an Afghan identity card.

Esmatullah Yaqoob, the Taliban commissioner in Torkham, said that these Afghan refugees can return to Afghanistan till the end of June 2023.

With the Taliban's takeover of Afghanistan in 2021 and the influx of Afghan refugees to Pakistan, the Pakistani police have repeatedly arrested and deported these refugees in the past two years.

Pakistani authorities argue that according to Article 14 of the Foreigners' Registration Law in this country, people who stay in Pakistan without travel documents and visas are accused of violating the law.

It has been reported that the Pakistani police have detained and deported some Afghan citizens despite having documents from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Pakistan.

At the same time, reports indicate the inappropriate behaviour of the Pakistani police towards Afghan refugees.

Before their new appointments, Mohammad Ayub Khalid had been the governor of Kunar and Abu Hamza was the Taliban’s governor of Zabul.

According to the Taliban-controlled Bakhtar News Agency, Mawlawi Abdul Jamil, the former judge in Badakhshan, has been appointed as the deputy governor of the province.

Mawlawi Afghan was the former deputy commander of the Taliban's 217 Omari Corps, who has taken over as the group’s governor of Zabul province.

According to Bakhtar News Agency, Mawlawi Amanuddin Mansour, the former governor of the group in Badakhshan, has been appointed as the new commander of the 217 Omari Corps, and Mullah Agha Mohammad Ibrahim, the former commander of the Taliban’s army corps, has been demoted and appointed as deputy commander of the 217 Omari Corps.

Vahidi said that the purpose of this committee is to verify the Taliban's claims about water scarcity and determine rights of Iran.

Earlier, the Taliban had said that there is not enough water in the Kajaki Dam in Afghanistan.

Vahidi added that with the formation of this committee, it will be clear if the Taliban or Iranian experts’ claims are right.

Vahidi said that the joint committee must visit the dams and assess the water level.

At the same time, Iran's interior minister has quoted the country's special envoy for Afghanistan as saying that the Taliban have agreed to the idea of forming a joint committee by the two sides.

The water rights issue between Iran and Afghanistan has escalated over the past few months.

Earlier, Feda Hossein Maliki, a member of the National Security and Foreign Policy Commission of the Iranian Parliament said that the water rights issue has become a military priority of the Islamic Republic.

Maliki emphasised that "no group" in Afghanistan can deprive Iran of its water rights from the Helmand River.

Maliki said that the Islamic Republic has no issue with the people of Afghanistan, but Tehran will not allow a group in the country to deprive Iran of its water rights.

On Friday, he also said that the Taliban will finally be forced to provide the water rights of Iran.

The Taliban officials have always emphasised that there is not enough water in the Helmand River.

The World Drug Report 2023 also stated in the report that the bulk of global illicit opium production continues to take place in Afghanistan, wherein in 2022, production reached 6,200 tonnes, equivalent to 80% of the estimated global production.

It also stated that there was less opium being produced in Afghanistan (10 per cent less) as compared to last year due to droughts in early 2022.

The report emphasised that the 2023 opium harvest in Afghanistan may see a drastic drop following the 2022 national drug ban, with possible global consequences. Early reports even suggest reductions in poppy cultivation in Afghanistan.

The report highlighted that the recent drug ban by the Taliban may be changing the drug supply in that country. “Continued reports and seizure events involving methamphetamine originating in Afghanistan suggest that the drug economy in that country is no longer exclusively dominated by illicit cultivation and trafficking of opiates,” the report stressed.

It also stated that the increase in the use and manufacture of methamphetamine in Afghanistan is of growing concern in South-West Asia and the Gulf, where trafficking in the substance is expanding beyond this region.

Alternative cultivation for farmers in Afghanistan and other countries is a vital factor in reducing poppy cultivation, according to the report and UNODC has called the lack of alternative cultivation options as detrimental for many farmers.

The UN has called on donor countries to immediately support rural Afghans so they can earn a living without cultivation of drugs.

The Taliban banned the cultivation and sale of narcotics in Afghanistan recently.