But, especially at a time when the new government has been met with a resistance movement and signs of urban protest, the collection of hard-liners “indicates the Taliban’s intent of further cracking down to consolidate domestic support,” said Caroline Rose of the Newlines Institute for Strategy and Policy, a Washington think tank. The new Taliban government is officially a caretaker one. “What do they owe their wealthy and/or well-placed patrons in return?” The absence of some senior Taliban figures “shows the Haqqanis have for now emerged victorious in the struggle for power between Kandahar and Paktia,” Ali said. “The Taliban’s past, present, and future are one and the same,” Ali said, describing the lineup as “a ‘new’ cabinet of ruthless assassins.”Įven so, there was plenty of time for factional infighting, which pushed back the new government’s announcement. Yaqoob has headed the Taliban’s military commission, is taking kudos for the military victory, and is popular with commanders and fighters alike. Mullah Mohammad Yaqoob, son of Taliban founder Mullah Mohammad Omar, the one-eyed cleric, is now defense minister. He is one of the FBI’s most wanted men with a $10 million bounty on his head. Sirajuddin Haqqani, deputy leader of the Taliban and now interior minister, heads the Haqqani network and is responsible for some of the most heinous attacks on Afghan civilians as well as government and military targets throughout the war. More than a dozen members of the cabinet are on the U.N. Old names have rewarded themselves with power, providing what Ali Mohammad Ali, a senior security official in the former government, described as a “clear indication that the group’s modus operandi hasn’t changed and will not change.” The new government of Taliban loyalists is unlikely to rise to these challenges in a way that offers any semblance of the government-no matter how flawed-Afghan people have come to expect. Hundreds of thousands of people face drought-induced hunger, many more have been displaced by the 20-year war, and COVID-19 continues to stalk the country. Most economic activity has stopped, leading to a cash crisis and soaring inflation. 15, the Taliban have struggled with a variety of challenges that would test even a competent government. Journalists covering the demonstrations were also beaten-some requiring hospitalization- and several were arrested, sparking concerns over press freedom in the new “old Afghanistan.” Women protested misogynistic policies in Kabul and other cities this week and were promptly beaten by the Taliban. Kabul residents report house searches, property confiscation, revenge beatings, and killings. As university classes resumed with male and female students separated by partitions, the new minister of education said, effectively, that education is unnecessary. The sinister Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice has been reestablished. The Ministry of Women’s Affairs has been abolished as has women’s participation in sports. Women have no positions in the interim government. The 33-member interim cabinet announced this week is exclusively male, exclusively Taliban, and almost exclusively Pashtun, meaning the old guard of the hated 1996-2001 regime is back in power, with tyranny more a reality than a threat for the majority of Afghanistan’s almost 40 million people. Almost a month after taking control of Afghanistan and overseeing an economic collapse while violently suppressing public protests, the Taliban have announced a government of mullahs and black-listed terrorists that takes the country back a quarter century in time and hints at dark days to come.
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