Catalogue Search | MBRL
Are you sure you want to remove the book from the shelf?
{{itemTitle}}
1,812
result(s) for
"Taliban"
Sort by:
International law and the Taliban's legal status: Emerging recognition criteria?
After the American-mediated attempts at facilitating a negotiated transition failed in Doha, on August 15, 2021, the Taliban retook the Afghan capital and soon after reestablished the \"Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan\" (2021-) along with a caretaker government. The forceful return of the Taliban to power in Afghanistan poses difficult questions of international law. Chief among these questions is who has the right to represent the Afghan state internationally after August 15, 2021. Applying the rules of public international to the case of the Taliban's caretaker government, this article argues that the strongest argument for disqualifying the Taliban as a government capable of representing Afghanistan is that the regime espouses principles, as a matter for formal governmental policies, which, in their totality, are so fundamentally discriminatory that they violate 'jus cogens' norms of international law. These violations are especially egregious regarding the Taliban's treatment of women. In many ways, the Taliban's gender-based discrimination shares similarities to South Africa's racial apartheid. As a result, the Taliban's effective control over Afghanistan may not be enough to confer on it the status of a \"government\" under international law. This argument depends on the comparability of race-based discrimination with some fundamental forms of gender-based discrimination in a world where gender-based restrictions are not uncommon albeit not to the extent that the Taliban imposes. The Taliban's caretaker government has provided the occasion where the unanimous condemnation of the international community could indicate that international law has come to contain a jus cogens norm banning some fundamental forms of gender-based discrimination denying admission to a government that holds those policies de jure recognition under international law.
Journal Article
Dying to Live
Embracing the tactic of suicide bombings first in 2003, the Taliban in Afghanistan quickly emerged as the leading terrorist group in the world that has claimed responsibility for such bombings. Over a period of more than 10 years, the group has indiscriminately carried out hundreds of suicide bombings across the country. How have the Taliban managed to operationalize one of the most notorious bombing tactics against all the existing social and cultural odds of Afghan society? To answer this question, this study, by applying qualitative thematic analysis, examined the contents of the Taliban’s written and audio-visual materials on suicide bombings. Two dominant narratives, namely “Istish-haadi” [seeking martyrdom] and “love to death,” that are at the core of the Taliban’s produced literature on suicide bombings, have supplied the group with dispensable human bombs. These bombers, the study concludes, are “dying to live”.
Journal Article
The Taliban in Afghanistan
Describes what the Taliban is and how it affects life in Afghanistan and around the world.
Book
Mirage or Oasis? Assessing the Role of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan
During a 20-year civil war, the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) has served as a bastion of international support, democratic values, and humanitarian assistance. Highlighting democratization, security, economic assistance, and human rights, we employed over 20 years of United Nations (UN) archives to examine the effectiveness of its mission mandates, and found that UNAMA had reduced child labor and judicial corruption while increasing civil society and facilitating international humanitarian aid. However, UNAMA failed to improve security or establish an inclusive government, particularly with respect to human rights violations. After the US military withdrawal in 2021, the future of UNAMA is contingent upon political negotiations with the Taliban. Only time will tell whether contributions of the mission will persist into the post-conflict era. KCI Citation Count: 0
Journal Article
Counter-terrorism cooperation in Central Asia after the Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan: strategic and institutional adaptation
The August 2021 withdrawal of U.S. forces from Afghanistan and the Taliban’s subsequent takeover sent shockwaves across Central Asia. While the return of the Taliban has been widely regarded as a threat to regional security, Afghanistan’s neighbors have taken a pragmatic approach to the regime, pursuing a policy of selective engagement. The February 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, now in its fourth year, has further deteriorated the security environment in Central Asia. This ongoing conflict has weakened Russia’s traditional role as a provider of military stability and has facilitated the expansion of China’s security presence in the region. The overall aim of this study is to examine how changes in the regional security environment, specifically the Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, have impacted China’s counter-terrorism strategy in Central Asia. The study is divided into three distinct sections. Following the introduction, Section 2 presents an analytic framework for assessing strategic and institutional adaptation of security actors in the realm of counter-terrorism. Section 3 focuses on the period between the 9/11 attacks and the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, mapping out the emergence and evolution of counter-terrorism cooperation across multilateral, minilateral, and bilateral levels. Section 4 examines strategic and institutional adaptation measures developed by China and its Central Asian partners in response to the Taliban’s 2021 takeover of Afghanistan. The findings of this study will contribute to the ongoing discussion on non-Western responses to transnational security threats, and how those responses relate to liberal interventionism.
Journal Article