Iran Asks Taliban To Consider Principles of Border Management

The Taliban released a photo of what appears to be a public reception by Bin Salman, saying that Mullah Yaqoob met the Saudi Crown Prince.

According to the Saudi Press Agency, among high-ranking foreign officials, the Saudi Crown Prince hosted the King of Malaysia, and the presidents of Pakistan, Senegal, and Bangladesh and shook hands with them.

Meanwhile, Taliban spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid posted a photo of a handshake of the Taliban defence minister with the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia on Twitter and said that Mullah Yaqoob "met with the crown prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Salman, during the Hajj trip”.

It is not clear whether the Taliban's defence minister was invited to Bin Salman's annual meet or not. The Saudi Press Agency did not mention details about the participation of the Taliban officials at the reception too.

Saudi Arabia is one of the most powerful Islamic countries which has not yet recognised the Taliban government. However, it seems that the Taliban spokesperson wanted to show that the group's defence minister was received in Saudi Arabia like other foreign officials by publishing the photo of Mullah Yaqoob shaking hands with Mohammed Bin Salman.

A news agency reported that some of these refugees have contracted scabies due to the lack of public sanitation and an overcrowded environment.

These Afghan citizens have been transferred with a humanitarian visa to Sao Paulo, Brazil, following the Taliban's takeover of the country in August 2021.

According to the Cuban state news agency, the 206 Afghan refugees are now forced to live in a corner on the busiest terminal in South America due to the lack of shelter.

Nawid Haidari, a 39-year-old Afghan refugee who worked as a translator for NATO forces in Afghanistan, said that fearing retaliation after the Taliban returned to power, he fled to Iran with his wife and four children, where he managed to obtain a Brazilian humanitarian visa.

He said that they don't have a place to wash dishes and clothes, and it's hard to sleep with the noise of air conditioners, but Haidari stressed that “it is better than being on the street with children”.

According to the Brazilian government, 405 Afghans have applied for asylum in the country in 2022 and 311 Afghans have applied for asylum in the country in the first five months of 2023.

The municipality of Sao Paulo has provided only 177 beds for immigrants and refugees and these centers are full and have no further capacity for new arrivals.

Bahrami stressed that governance and Taliban policies towards foreign extremist groups are the reasons for international players’ non-recognition of the group.

The Iranian diplomat said on Twitter that the consequence of the current situation in Afghanistan is the inevitable deepening of internal rifts between the Taliban factions, which according to Bahrami, is based on the struggle for power.

Recently, addressing the UN Security Council, Roza Otunbayeva, the UN Secretary General's special representative for Afghanistan, said that it is impossible to recognise the Taliban as long as restrictions against women remain in place.

After taking over Afghanistan in August 2021, the Taliban imposed extensive restrictions on Afghan women and girls. The group has been accused of serious human rights violations across the country.

Even though the international community has repeatedly asked the Taliban to lift these bans and restrictions, the Taliban has insisted on its position of depriving Afghan women and girls from their right to work and education.

However, in an audio tape attributed to the Taliban leader, Hibatullah Akhundzada, and published on Wednesday, on the occasion of Eid al-Adha, it has been stated that the world has refused to recognise the Taliban government because of the "shame of failure" in Afghanistan.

The Taliban leader said that it isn’t true that the international community doesn’t recognise the Taliban due to the group taking power by force in Afghanistan.

In this audio tape, the leader of the Taliban emphasised that the group will not "negotiate" on the implementation of Sharia law.

Akhundzada added that the implementation of Sharia continues, and he is trying to make the entire Taliban government and laws Sharia-based.

The Gallup surveys has been conducted in July and August 2022 and showed that 98 percent of Afghans rated their life so poorly that they were considered as suffering.

According to Gallup surveys, Afghan participants said that after the return of the Taliban to power in 2021, people’s lives have become worse than at any time in the last ten years.

Although the Taliban officials have repeatedly talked about improvements in the life of Afghans due to better security situation, however, Afghans’ feelings about the quality of life in Afghanistan have also worsened since the beginning of the Taliban reign in Afghanistan in 2021.

According to the Gallup surveys, in 2021, 94 percent of Afghans had described their life as extremely bad.

Gallup added that Afghanistan has ranked as the least positive country in the world every year since 2017, apart from 2020 when Gallup could not survey the country because of the pandemic.

According to the 2018 Gallup survey, the violence caused by the insurgency and war in Afghanistan and poverty had a devastating impact on the lives of the Afghan people during which 36 percent of Afghans said that they don’t remember to have smiled or laughed in the previous day when the survey was conducted.

The Taliban have reacted to reports of international organisations and have rejected these reports as foreign propaganda.

In a statement on Tuesday, the court said that these prisoners were released from prisons all over Afghanistan ahead of Eid al-Adha.

The statement added that the prison terms of 479 other prisoners were also reduced based on the Taliban leader’s decree.

The Taliban’s Supreme Court, however, did not explain the crimes of these prisoners.

Earlier, the Taliban Prisons Authority announced that more than 17,500 people have been prisoners of the group across Afghanistan.

After the Taliban’s return to power in August 2021, there have been reports of torture and human rights violations in the group’s prison.