Ramiz Alakbarov, UN Deputy Special Representative and Humanitarian Coordinator for Afghanistan, updated journalists in New York on developments in a country where 28 million people now depend on aid to survive. Immense humanitarian needs “Afghanistan remains the world’s largest humanitarian crisis in 2023, notwithstanding, of course, the recent devastating earthquakes...
Deputy Secretary-General, Amina Mohammed, the Executive Director of UN Women, Sima Bahous, and the Assistant Secretary-General for UN political, peacebuilding and peace operations, Khaled Khiari, spend four days on a fact-finding mission in Afghanistan, to engage with Taliban leaders, and “underscore UN solidarity with the Afghan people”, according to a press release...
“Lawyers, judges, prosecutors and other actors involved with the legal system in Afghanistan face grave risks to their safety, and those still practicing must navigate a deeply challenging, non-independent legal system”, Special Rapporteurs Margaret Satterthwaite, on the independence of judges and lawyers, and Richard Bennett, on the situation of human...
“No country can develop – indeed survive – socially and economically with half its population excluded”, said the High Commissioner for Human Rights. “These unfathomable restrictions placed on women and girls will not only increase the suffering of all Afghans but, I fear, pose a risk beyond Afghanistan’s borders”. He...
A statement issued by Spokesman Stéphane Dujarric said that Secretary-General António Guterres was “deeply disturbed by the reported order of the de facto Taliban authorities” and that the UN chief “reiterates the rights of all women to participate in the workforce thus contributing to the greater good.” According to media reports, the Taliban ordered all...
Briefing ambassadors, the new UN Special Representative in Afghanistan and UNAMA chief, Roza Otunbayeva, highlighted ongoing political and human rights concerns – as well as several positive developments – since the Taliban’s seizure of power in August 2021. “We do not see eye to eye with the Taliban on a...
These punishments began after Taliban Supreme Leader Haibatullah Akhundzada last month ordered judges to uphold aspects of Islamic law. “We call on the de facto authorities to immediately establish a moratorium on the death penalty, prohibit flogging and other physical punishments that constitute torture, or other cruel, inhuman or degrading...
Csaba Kőrösi painted a near apocalyptic picture of ordinary life in the Taliban-ruled nation that has endured almost five decades of “relentless conflict”, urging the international community to make up the $2.3 billion shortfall in the UN humanitarian appeal for $4.4 billion. ‘Moral imperative’ In a powerful speech to ambassadors in New...
Opium cultivation in Afghanistan – latest findings and emerging threats, is the first report on the illicit opium trade since the Taliban’s return to power in August 2021. The authorities banned all cultivation of opium poppy and all narcotics under strict new laws, in April 2022. Opium is the essential...
“The future is immensely bleak for Afghans if more is not done by the international community to ensure the Taliban changes its modus operandi and complies with its human rights obligations,” they said in a statement. The experts recalled that following the Taliban takeover last August, they had appealed for...
Following the Taliban takeover last August, UN agencies and their partners remained in Afghanistan, providing aid to nearly 23 million people, or nearly 94 per cent of all those who require support. Humanitarians expanded their operations to reach communities across all 34 provinces, and their work has saved lives and...
One of the UN teams on the ground, the refugee agency UNHCR, transported tons of relief items into the provinces of Khost and Paktika, where several thousand houses were destroyed or damaged by the 5.9 magnitude quake that struck early on Wednesday. The latest tally from Thursday evening indicated that at least 1,036...