Qayum Malang, commander of the Sepah-e Mihan Front, released his first audio message five days after the attack on Yaftal district in Badakhshan, saying he and his fighters were safe.
Malang said on Wednesday, 22 July: “I am in full health. Do not follow the enemy’s propaganda. We are all safe and well.”
He also stressed that the front “has its own plans and objectives” and that its members prefer freedom above everything else.
The newly formed Sepah-e Mihan Front recently launched a surprise attack and seized Yaftali Sufla district, near Faizabad, the capital of Badakhshan province, for several hours.
The attackers entered government buildings, seized some military equipment and raised their flag over several buildings.
The attack brought Qayum Malang into the spotlight. The young commander led the military operation that resulted in the temporary capture of Yaftal.
Following the incident, the Taliban said it had detained several Sepah-e Mihan fighters.
In his first audio message, Malang rejected the claim and said all members of the front were safe and in good health. He urged supporters not to pay attention to Taliban propaganda.
Yaftali Sufla is one of the important districts of Badakhshan province. Its brief capture by an anti-Taliban group has become one of the province’s most significant recent security developments and continues to prompt political reactions and analysis.
Following Sepah-e Mihan’s unprecedented attack on Yaftal, the Taliban assigned its army chief, Fasihuddin Fitrat, to contain the group.
Fitrat travelled from Kabul to Yaftal in Badakhshan and claimed the attackers’ operation had been thwarted and that they had failed to achieve their objectives.
The Taliban army chief said in Badakhshan that authorities had learned in advance of the armed attackers’ plan to target Yaftal district.
He said they had received information early in the morning that the “enemy” planned to create unrest in Yaftal.
Fitrat added that after receiving the information, he travelled from Kabul to Badakhshan and ordered Taliban forces to act. He claimed the Taliban had thwarted the plan and prevented the attackers from achieving their objectives.
Hayatullah Muhajir Farahi, the Taliban’s deputy minister of information and culture, wrote on X on Friday that domestic and foreign enemies should understand the sensitivity of the Taliban’s security forces to any threat against the area.
The Taliban official also said that those who, in his words, obstruct Afghanistan’s economic progress “do not deserve any mercy”.
Sources told Afghanistan International that the Taliban has compiled lists of former security personnel in Kandahar, Helmand and Uruzgan and begun surveilling them, including by phone to verify where they live.
According to the sources, a joint 10-member team made up of representatives from the Taliban’s intelligence service, police command, governor’s office, statistics authority and Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice has begun tracking former government security personnel based on the compiled lists.
The sources said the Taliban contacts former security personnel by phone to verify their current place of residence and activities. The lists include their names, fathers’ names, original and current addresses, phone numbers and employment records.
One former security officer in Kandahar told Afghanistan International: “The purpose of this measure is to determine where former security personnel are now and what they are doing.”
Another former security officer whose name appears on one of the lists and who was contacted said: “Most of the information in these lists relates to former National Police and Local Police forces affiliated with the former government’s National Directorate of Security.”
A Taliban source in Kandahar confirmed to Afghanistan International that the lists contain information on 900 former security personnel in Zhari district, 700 in Shah Wali Kot, 700 in Panjwayi, 300 in Maiwand and 800 in Dand Wa Patan district.
According to the source, information on former security personnel in other districts has also been collected, but details have not been released.
The source, who is involved in the monitoring process, said the Taliban’s aim is to keep information on former security personnel up to date and ensure that they do not pose a threat to the group.
Two sources had previously told Afghanistan International that the Taliban’s intelligence service held a meeting on Saturday in Kandahar with a number of former security personnel from the province.
According to one source, former security personnel at the meeting were warned to limit travel outside Kandahar city or inform the Taliban’s intelligence authorities before travelling.
A girl due to enter seventh grade in 2022 is now about 17 or 18. Had things continued normally, she would have finished school and be preparing for the university entrance exam.
But five years of education bans have changed the course of her life. She still has no 12th-grade certificate, and the path to university and many job opportunities remains closed.
If the ban on girls’ education continues, Afghanistan could face shortages of thousands of female teachers, doctors and midwives by 2030, with consequences that will reshape education, the economy and the health system.
This report examines how this deprivation could affect education, health, the economy, the labour market, the generation of professional women, and children raised by mothers denied access to education by 2030.
Hundreds of Thousands of Women and Girls Deprived
Reports by UNESCO and UNICEF, both UN agencies, show that 2.2 million adolescent girls in Afghanistan are currently denied access to secondary education.
UNICEF estimates that every additional year the ban continues will prevent about 250,000 more girls from continuing their education. If the restrictions remain in place, more than two million additional girls could be denied education beyond primary school by 2030.
Mirwais Balkhi, former education minister of Afghanistan, says the continuation of the current situation is deepening both the educational gap between women and men and Afghanistan’s knowledge gap with the rest of the world each year.
According to him, the divide between women and men, and between Afghanistan and the world, is widening.
Balkhi says the exclusion of girls, the declining number of female teachers, limited alternative education and the expansion of ideological instruction have weakened Afghanistan’s academic and educational capacity.
He believes Afghanistan’s education system has undergone a structural collapse, with the Taliban reducing the concept of education largely to basic literacy in reading and writing, while many children fail to acquire even these fundamental skills.
Abdul Ghafoor Arezo, Afghanistan’s former ambassador to Tajikistan, also told Afghanistan International that hostility towards knowledge may not endure indefinitely, but it can hold back a society’s progress for years.
Arezo said that because of Taliban restrictions on women, Afghanistan is heading towards deeper backwardness and greater darkness by 2030, while its civic and academic achievements are being lost.
These warnings come as Afghanistan had been on a very different path before the Taliban returned to power. The number of female university students rose from about 5,000 in 2001 to more than 100,000 by 2021. Many were only months away from graduating.
That progress has now stopped. Even if universities reopen, the generation that was expected to enter the workforce between 2021 and 2030 will no longer exist in the same form. The first signs of this gap are expected to emerge in education and healthcare.
UNESCO has raised concerns extending far beyond the next four years, saying that if the suspension of women’s higher education continues, it could reduce Afghanistan’s economic potential by about $9.6 billion by 2066.
That figure is close to two-thirds of the country’s current gross domestic product.
A recent UNICEF assessment shows that if the restrictions continue, Afghanistan could lose about 20,000 female teachers by 2030 through retirement and migration.
The agency has also warned of the possible loss of 5,400 female health workers. Together, these workers account for nearly a quarter of the female workforce employed in those two sectors in 2021.
Who Will Treat Afghanistan’s Women?
Restrictions on girls’ education have not only emptied classrooms. They have also halted the training of thousands of female doctors, midwives, nurses and other health workers at a time when Afghanistan’s healthcare system needs them more than ever.
In many parts of Afghanistan, particularly rural areas, women seek treatment only at health facilities where female staff are available. As a result, the shortage of female doctors and midwives is not merely an educational issue; it directly affects millions of women’s access to healthcare.
In 2023, the Taliban also stopped women from studying at medical institutes.
Dr Abdul Hakim Tamanna, former head of public health in Herat and a senior public health specialist, says the healthcare crisis will become visible well before 2030.
He says some female health workers will reach retirement age. Others will migrate because of restrictions and difficult living conditions, while some will leave their jobs under growing work pressure.
According to him, the central problem is that no women are being trained to replace them.
Rising Maternal and Infant Deaths
Afghanistan already has one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the world.
The World Health Organisation says one woman dies during childbirth in Afghanistan every two hours.
UNICEF has warned that a decline in the number of female doctors and midwives could lead to 1,600 additional maternal deaths and more than 3,500 additional infant deaths.
Dr Tamanna says the absence of female health workers deprives women of pregnancy and childbirth services, treatment for illnesses and preventive care.
According to him, rising maternal deaths, infant deaths and disabilities among women also break families apart. A child who loses their mother during childbirth faces greater risks related to nutrition, health, education and family support.
He describes the outlook for Afghanistan’s health system in 2030, if the current situation continues, as a humanitarian catastrophe and says the long-term cost of illness, death and disability among women could reach tens of billions of dollars.
The World Health Organisation says nearly half of all deaths in Afghanistan are caused by non-communicable diseases, and their share is expected to increase by 2030.
Despite this, the Taliban does not allow women to study midwifery or nursing. The UN Population Fund has estimated that if the ban on girls’ education continues, Afghanistan could face a shortage of about 18,000 midwives and more than 7,000 female doctors by 2030.
This shortage would reduce the health system’s capacity to provide services to millions of women.
Afghanistan’s Economy Becomes More Male-Dominated
Experts say banning women from education will affect Afghanistan’s economy for years. A country where half the population is denied education and many employment opportunities loses a major share of its productive, innovative and economic potential.
An economics professor at an Afghan university, who asked not to be named because of security concerns, says excluding women from education shrinks Afghanistan’s human capital.
He says educating women is an economic investment. An educated woman can work, increase household income, build a business and contribute to production and services.
According to him, excluding women from education makes families more dependent on the income of a single man. Illness, unemployment, disability or the death of that man can push the entire family into poverty.
World Bank data shows that women’s labour force participation in Afghanistan stood at about 5.1 per cent in 2025, compared with 69.8 per cent for men. Women accounted for only 6.8 per cent of the country’s total workforce.
UN Women says 78 per cent of young Afghan women are neither in education, employment nor skills training. The figure for young men is 20 per cent.
The UN Development Programme estimates that restrictions imposed on women and girls caused nearly $920 million in losses to Afghanistan’s economy between 2024 and 2026, equivalent to about 5.8 per cent of the country’s GDP.
UNICEF has also estimated that the direct annual economic loss caused by restrictions on women’s education and economic participation is at least $84 million.
The economics professor says the situation also reduces employment opportunities for men.
When a school or health centre becomes weak or closes because of the lack of female teachers or health workers, male employees, drivers, guards, shopkeepers and related service companies also lose income.
According to him, Afghanistan’s economy will become even more dependent on foreign aid by 2030.
Mothers’ Deprivation Harms Children’s Opportunities
Years of educational deprivation for girls could also affect the children they will have in the future.
Research by the World Bank, UNESCO and UNICEF shows that a mother’s education is one of the most important factors determining children’s health, nutrition and education.
Women with more education generally seek healthcare earlier, are more likely to send their children to school and invest more in their nutrition and development.
UNICEF analysis shows a strong relationship between mothers’ education and children’s vaccination, healthy height and weight, and access to antenatal care.
The agency has warned that declining levels of education among women could worsen the health of mothers and children.
A former female lecturer at Kabul University who still lives in Afghanistan says that in a household where the mother has no independent income, all expenses depend on a single breadwinner.
Such families are more vulnerable to unemployment, illness, drought and displacement.
She said family poverty can also force a child out of school. In this way, denying education to today’s girl may mean fewer opportunities for tomorrow’s child.
According to her, in poor families, when girls are denied education and employment, pressure for early marriage also increases.
The United Nations estimates that the education ban could increase child marriage by 25 per cent and put about 37 per cent of Afghan girls at risk of marriage before the age of 18.
She said girls excluded from school face the same unanswered question every day: when will they be able to return to a normal life?
A UN Women assessment shows that during the first three months of 2024, about 21 per cent of women surveyed had not had a single social interaction with a woman outside their own family.
This isolation was reported more frequently in urban areas.
Migration Deepens the Shortage of Specialists
Those interviewed by Afghanistan International believe the country is losing two generations at the same time: a new generation of women denied access to specialist education, and part of the existing generation of skilled women and men who are leaving the country.
Dr Tamana says work pressure, restrictions and the absence of a clear future are pushing some educated women to leave Afghanistan.
He says families that can afford to do so are also moving abroad to educate their daughters.
As these families leave, Afghanistan simultaneously loses knowledge, experience, capital and labour.
What Will Afghanistan Look Like in 2030?
Afghanistan in 2030 will still carry the effects of five years of girls being denied education, even if schools and universities reopen before then.
Reopening educational institutions could prevent the crisis from becoming even worse, but it cannot erase the years already lost.
Recovering from those lost years would require a broad programme of remedial education, returning women to universities, urgently training teachers and health workers, and creating employment opportunities.
Basir Ahmad Danishyar, a university lecturer who has since moved to Germany, says that if the current situation continues, Afghanistan will lose a large share of its human capital and academic capacity.
The country will face declining knowledge production, reduced innovation and increasing difficulty in training skilled professionals.
Universities and higher education institutions will face shortages of lecturers, researchers and specialised staff.
Migration will increase, development indicators will deteriorate, and valuable opportunities for sustainable development, particularly in knowledge, research and scientific production, will be lost further.
For many countries, 2030 is expected to be a milestone for assessing global development goals. Countries are working to expand equal access to education, healthcare, technology and employment.
Countries across the region are training increasing numbers of female doctors, engineers, researchers and specialists every year.
Balkhi says that under such circumstances, Afghanistan will be pushed to the scientific margins of the region.
In his view, a system that does not nurture critical thinking, skills and specialised knowledge cannot prepare the human resources required for development.
Every year of delay increases the number of girls who grow beyond school age and take on new family responsibilities.
Sources in Kandahar told Afghanistan International that the Taliban leader’s office rejected a request by representatives of the World Bank, Asian Development Bank and other global organisations to meet Hibatullah Akhundzada.
According to the sources, the delegation requested a meeting with Akhundzada during a visit to Kandahar on Monday.
Over the past five years, the Taliban leader has not met any foreign official apart from the prime minister of Qatar.
The sources said the foreign delegation included officials from the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation and the International Finance Corporation.
The delegation raised the request during a meeting with Mullah Shirin, the Taliban governor of Kandahar, but it was not accepted.
Two separate sources told Afghanistan International that before the request was even conveyed to the Taliban leader, members of the delegation were told during the same meeting that such a meeting could not be arranged.
The delegation included Wagma Mohmand, head of the International Finance Corporation’s Kabul office, as well as other women.
According to one source, after receiving the response, the international delegation dropped the request and continued with the rest of its programme.
This is not the first time foreign delegations visiting Kandahar have sought a meeting with the Taliban leader.
Hibatullah Akhundzada is among the most internationally isolated leaders. He has made no foreign trips over the past five years.
Since August 2021, representatives of various countries, UN officials and delegations from international organisations have sought meetings with the Taliban leader, but those efforts have been unsuccessful.
Rather than meeting foreign representatives directly, the Taliban leader maintains communications through his office and a limited number of channels.
One source said there are concerns within the Taliban leadership that direct meetings with foreign officials could affect the leader’s security, the confidentiality of decision-making and his policy of maintaining a limited public presence. For that reason, his close advisers prevent such meetings from taking place.
Political analysts say that although the day-to-day administration of the Taliban government is handled by ministers and other officials, major political and strategic decisions are still made in Hibatullah Akhundzada’s office.
As a result, direct access to him could be influential for representatives of international organisations and foreign governments.
Over the past five years, the international community has been unable to influence Hibatullah Akhundzada’s decisions on policies it opposes, including restrictions on women and girls’ education and employment.
A day after unidentified attackers fired rockets at a Taliban border battalion in Badakhshan’s Khwahan district, a Taliban Defence Ministry official met Tajikistan’s ambassador in Kabul to discuss border issues.
The Taliban Defence Ministry said on Monday that Noor Rahman Nusrat, the army’s director of military operations, met Tajik Ambassador Saadi Sharifi to discuss border issues.
In a statement issued on Monday, 20 July, the ministry said the two sides emphasised relations based on goodwill and stronger bilateral cooperation.
The statement gave no further details about the discussions.
The meeting came a day after unidentified gunmen attacked a Taliban border battalion in Khwahan district of Badakhshan early on Sunday, 19 July.
No group has claimed responsibility for the attack, but Taliban forces detained several local residents in connection with the incident.
The Taliban border battalion was reportedly targeted at about 2am with rockets and several types of weapons.
Khwahan is a district in north-eastern Badakhshan province, located along the Panj River and sharing a border with Tajikistan.
Taliban Focuses on Controlling Badakhshan
The Taliban has recently intensified efforts to suppress unrest and strengthen control in Badakhshan.
In recent weeks, senior Taliban security officials, including Defence Minister Mohammad Yaqoob Mujahid, army chief Fasihuddin Fitrat and intelligence chief Abdul Haq Wasiq, have travelled to Badakhshan amid growing local discontent.
During his visit, Mullah Yaqoob inspected border areas near Pakistan, China and Tajikistan.
Early on Friday, the newly formed Sepah-e Mihan group briefly seized Yaftal district in Badakhshan for several hours. The Taliban is concerned that growing local dissatisfaction could lead to the loss of control over parts of the province.
Central Asian countries also have security concerns, particularly that increasing instability could allow militant groups such as Islamic State and al-Qaeda to gain strength in border areas.
Regional Security Concerns
Russian and Central Asian officials discussed mechanisms for addressing security threats at the third meeting of Russia-Central Asia Security Council secretaries.
Sergei Shoigu, secretary of Russia’s Security Council, said at the 21st meeting of Shanghai Cooperation Organisation Security Council secretaries on 14 May that between 18,000 and 23,000 militants belonging to more than 20 groups were active in Afghanistan.
He said developments in Afghanistan were of particular importance to Shanghai Cooperation Organisation member states.
The Taliban-run central bank has urged the Afghanistan Credit Guarantee Foundation to provide its services equally across the country without discrimination.
In response, officials from the Afghanistan Credit Guarantee Foundation asked the Taliban central bank to provide the necessary facilities to expand support for small and medium-sized enterprises.
The Taliban central bank said on Monday, 20 July, that its deputy governor, Sediqullah Khalid, met Dirk Joseph Thyssen, deputy head of the Afghanistan Credit Guarantee Foundation, in Kabul.
According to the bank’s statement, the two sides discussed facilitating small guarantees, increasing grants and expanding technical cooperation.
The central bank said the meeting also focused on effective measures to improve citizens’ access to small and medium-sized financing.
The Afghanistan Credit Guarantee Foundation is a non-profit development organisation established to support Afghanistan’s private sector. Its main role is to provide credit guarantees to banks and financial institutions so that micro, small and medium-sized businesses can more easily access loans.
Thyssen asked the Taliban central bank to provide the necessary facilities to expand financing for small and medium-sized institutions.
He also called for greater technical cooperation between the central bank and financial institutions, the implementation of joint programmes and the signing of memorandums of understanding to strengthen bilateral cooperation.
The Afghanistan Credit Guarantee Foundation does not lend directly to individuals or companies. Instead, it provides guarantees to banks so they can offer loans to businesses.
The foundation was established in 2014 with support from the German government, building on a programme launched in 2004 with backing from Germany and the United States to improve Afghan businesses’ access to bank credit.
The Taliban central bank said both sides stressed the importance of continued cooperation to expand financial inclusion, support the private sector and further strengthen Afghanistan’s financial and banking sectors.