Life and geopolitics in Afghanistan - a first person account
Background (Rahul Deans): I used to do business in Afghanistan some 25 years ago. At the time, `business’ in Afghanistan consisted of importing goods from Dubai, into Afghanistan, at zero duty and smuggling it into Iran and Pakistan, which taxed those imports heavily. Control of the border crossings and the smuggling business was heavily contested, between various warlords, as was the other business in Afghanistan – opium cultivation and smuggling out of Afghanistan. To me, that was what much of Afghanistan’s civil war was about.
In more recent times, I found that every account of the situation in
Afghanistan was by reporters who had never been to Afghanistan and were relying on old cliches to describe
the situation. To give a
first-person view, as I did in my recent blogpost on
Myanmar, I had invited an old contact, a person
from the Afghan army, who had been in intelligence and was unable to leave he
country after the
Taliban takeover. Unfortunately, he and his social media account appears to
have disappeared. Subsequently, another officer from the Afghan special forces reached out. I have featured his story in a separate post: https://rpdeans.blogspot.com/2025/07/fighting-taliban-and-betrayal-afghan.html
To my good fortune, a young medical student in Kabul, with an interest in International affairs, then contacted me me, to
have his voice heard. This is his story. `A’ has to remain anonymous, as any criticism of the Taliban
regime can result in that person’s death.
He has chosen to express himself in
his limited English. (Only grammar has been edited)
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Nowadays life in Afghanistan is bad, basically in economy
aspect, even they decreased the amount of government employees severely. They fired
over 100000 school employees couple of months ago. You know over here people
are trying their best to just escape from hunger, not like other countries to
make a good life or something, there are some differences between Taliban and
pervious govt like the amount thefts has decreased very much. There was two to
three bombing around Afghanistan every day in the previous govt, but we don't
have such things now, however people don't really care about these, they care
about money to release them from poverty and hunger and women education, as you
know they closed schools for girls. Taliban increased the water and electricity
prices. They collect wheat from the farmers during harvesting time which we
didn't have in the previous govt.
Life inside and outside Kabul is quite different, many
people who live in Kabul, have a good economic condition, so that they afford
living there but there are districts, provinces that people are very poor with
very low life quality, no good hospitality, no good education, no chance for
making good money to live better. In Kabul, 90% of people I guess, know nothing
about technology, far behind where the world is now.
The difference between Taliban and previous government -
One that I noticed, is they decreased road construction outside Kabul and
increased it inside. I don't know whether you Know Panjshare, a province of
Afghanistan it's was very good place in previous govt, now there is very much
restrictions there, they are annoying and make people of there to leave their
province. Since Masood’s son once attacked from Panjshare, they killed innocent
people a lot.
If we look at what most leaders of Taliban say they
really see Pakistan as an enemy, you might have heard of some attacks of
Taliban and Pakistan, however most people believe they are like members or
co-workers, Pakistan might support Afghan Taliban, as some people say, `we saw
Pakistani soldiers in Taliban's army’.
I think Afghan Taliban wants a good relationship with
Iran and India, I didn't hear anything about India from Taliban, we saw Taliban
say in the Iran Israel fight, that they were supporting Iran.
From my own point of view there is no role for India in
Afghanistan.
On Pashtun dominance in Afghanistan
In general, the relationship between Pashtun and other ethnic groups are very
bad. Since the Taliban takeover, I met people who were Tajiks they said when
you enter an office and you can't speak Pashto they won't solve your problem
and no one would listen to you. A Pashtun who is working in the labour and
social affairs office said they are dropping other ethnic groups out of jobs
and filling the gaps with Pashtuns. They removed Persian request sheets from
most of government offices and replaced them with the Pashto version of it. They
are destroying old forms in Persian after translating them to Pashto. Many
people say that if you apply for a job, you will first be asked in the
interview if you are Pathans or not. If you can't speak Pashto they won't even
let you in.
Most people in Taliban's government are Pashtun. What I
mean by this is they didn't give important jobs for other ethnic groups in
Afghanistan. A Tajik or Hazara might be a normal teacher, but they cannot
become head of Kabul university, Pashtuns are taking all the power jobs in the
government and didn't give anything to other ethnic groups.
I am in Afghanistan and I know how it feels to live here.
People are living in a bad situation, but the reality is no one wants to get
into trouble. They don't have any further wishes, they want to be alive and
that’s all,
On a Pashtun nation (comprising parts of Pakistan and Afghanistan)
There not such feelings for having a Pashtun nation in general, they might be
people who talk about such a thing. I think it is impossible though, people
won't let them. The point is if Pashto and Pathans are 45-50% then why would
they raise their children to learn Persian instead of Pashto? I am sorry but
according to what I've seen during school is that Pashto is dead language,
whether they claim we 45-50% of Afghanistan society or not they will adopt
Persian.
Factions in Afghanistan
There is ISKP (Islamic state of Khorasan Province). If someone is a member of
this they would like it, not because they are right or wrong, but because of
their benefits from them. But others who are not members they really hate them
and want to get rid them, me personally I don't like them.
They really are working actively, perhaps 20-30% of people in the area I am
living are belonging to this branch, I don't know whether they have sort of
salary or something.
The Taliban have two groups – Haqqani and Kandahari (also called Sirajuddin
& Hibattullah groups)
About Haqqani and Kandahari groups, there are conflicts between them, a friend
of mine who's working in ministry of public health he said to me " if
anyone noticed that you are in Haqqani group they will just dig your grave (you
will lose your job as soon as possible). One thing is the Kandahari group is
superior to Haqqani group. They really are running powerful ministries. I think
there will be an inner war between them, but when, God knows better
Status of the Hazaras (the largest minority, which is
Shia)
Hazara's condition changed (since the Taliban takeover), but
there is a good change and a bad one. The good change is they do not have
bombing anymore, like almost zero. And the bad one is that as you may know
Hazara ethics have their own culture, they celebrate days of Ashora is (عاشورا),
now Taliban are annoying they and not letting them to perform that celebration,
you might not notice what I said in Kabul, because it would make a bad identity
for Taliban, but they really don't allow people in rural areas to perform that.
Deportation of Afghans from Pakistan and Iran
It's very sad to talk about this, both countries asked Afghan employees
to leave the country. (1.2 million from Iran and 320,000 from Pakistan).
Even if you are owning a Passport and Visa, they just want you to leave and no
one really cares about that. about helping them - as I am a university student
I go to Kabul two to three times a week and I am seeing people who just came
from Iran or Pakistan, Taliban's government had prepared free transportation
for them, and maybe UN is giving them 8000 AFG per family when enter
Afghanistan. People might be angry about what Iran or Pakistan did to them, but
to be honest as they too are suffering from unemployment and lack of money,
they don't care how you treat them, but just help them make a few pennies so
that they can feed their families. Personally, I hate Iran and Pakistan.
Water situation with Pakistan: You may know
Tetsu Nakamura he was a good man he tried to help us by maintaining our water
and to use it for agriculture and other purposes, unfortunately they killed him
(in 2019). Many people believe Pakistan killed him, because a big portion of
Afghanistan water end up to be in Pakistan and Pakistan didn't want to lose
that.
On drugs: I didn't hear much about it, but I saw many news about
which said Taliban asked people who were planting poppy, to plant wheat, or
something beneficial and do not plant poppy.
What I guess, is places that people planting poppy are far from capital, mostly
near to borders. Media and government cannot reach out, not a big difference
between them and previous government.
Relations with the US and China:
There is a big difference between then and now. In the past, USA had a clear
image in Afghanistan, they were working actively, but now China has a good image,
China now is taking contracts from Mines all over country, specially Gold mines
in northern parts of the country, China facilitates everything from Afghan's
business people, and everyone can get Visas very easy. People really hate USA,
as Trump is standing for Afghanistan deportation. This makes our situation
worse. People blame the USA for our situation and they have the right to do so.
I am 21 years old, I am studying medicine in Kabul
medical university. I want to leave, as I said economy is not good here. The
reason i want to leave is I love business and entrepreneurship and I want build
business. Because people do not have knowledge and also power to support
entrepreneurs, I can't do anything here. What I found from today's Afghanistan
market, we severely need an Alibaba like company for delivery and communication
between small and big businesses and also a reliable payment system that people
can pay their money online. That way way we could develop they both, because
they are complementary to each other. But leave it, I cannot do it for now.
The context of this story:
I asked him about water in the context of the Indus water
treaty which I separately blogged about.
Just like the IWT, Pakistan gets 80% of the water from the 9 rivers rising in
Afghanistan. They do not want to negotiate a water sharing treaty. India has
built the Salma dam in Afghanistan, the only major dam project in recent years.
A Taliban delegation was recently in India to seek our help in the construction
of more dams. Irrespective of ideological differences, the Taliban recognise
that water is their most important resource, they are getting a bad deal from
Pak on water sharing and India is best placed to help them.
I write that smuggling was the biggest source of revenue for
the Taliban govt. Officially it is foreign aid. Because there was a threat to
stop all foreign aid after the Taliban takeover in 2020 and because the Taliban
wanted to show that they were against drugs, they officially banned the
cultivation of the Opium poppy in April ‘22. Some of the aid was contingent on
reducing Opium cultivation. Production of the Opium poppy in 2024 was 93% lower
than 2021 (though 30% higher than in 2023). While a fall of this magnitude, for
two consecutive years, has happened for the first time in Afghanistan, it is
deceptive for the following reasons:
There were high stocks, both with Afghan trader/exporters
(who are often rival warlords) and farmers, which were released into the market
once prices started increasing. These stocks are now depleting and the price of
Opium has increased from $ 100/ kg to $ 750, which is why opium production has
started increasing – albeit far below 2022 levels.
The centre of Opium production has shifted from the South
West of Afghanistan to the North West, which is less easy to monitor and where
the area is not under the control of the Taliban and populated by a large non-Pashtun
population. With the Pak-Afghan border fenced and more heavily guarded, the
traditional smuggling route into Pakistan has been affected. Money from this
route was earned by tribal leaders on both sides of the border. On the Afghan
side they were usually affiliated to the Taliban and on the Pak side, it would
be people from the same tribe (e.g. Meshud, Wazir, Afridi), as well as the Pak
army, who facilitates the trade. Drug money was also one of the causes of
conflict between Pashtun tribes in Pak and the Pak army.
Opium
has been replaced by Methamphetamine. The ephedra plant, from where Meth is
made, grows naturally in Afghanistan (unlike other countries with meth labs). Meth
labs, which convert
the plant to Meth, are easy to set up and operate and difficult to detect.
While Opium is haram in Islam and officially banned by the Taliban, there
appears to be no such stricture for Methamphetamine. Meth prices are a third of
the 2022 levels, while opium prices have increased seven times (to the same
level as Meth). Afghanistan is believed to the largest producer of meth
currently. A consequence has been a surge in crystal meth addiction in Pakistan (where there are over seven million known drug addicts). Most addicts seeking treatment in clinics in Pakistan are now addicted to crystal meth - earlier it was Cannabis, Opium & Heroin. While there is a wealth of information on Opium and its derivatives
in Afghanistan, there is far less data on Methamphetamine.
Methamphetamines may soon be the biggest source of income for the Taliban govt.
In a separate blogpost, I have a first person account from an Afghan Special forces officer, on
fighting the Taliban and the betrayal by the US.
Fighting the Taliban. A soldier's story
Further reading:
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