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☆ ISIS Affiliate Claims Responsibility for Deadly Attack at Rally in Pakistan
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-31 | by ( Christina Goldbaum | More About Christina Goldbaum | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

The Islamic State affiliate in South Asia claimed responsibility on Monday for a suicide bombing in northwest Pakistan that killed dozens of people and injured about 200 more, in the latest bloody sign of the deteriorating security situation in the country. The death toll from the explosion on Sunday, which targeted a political rally in the Bajaur district near Pakistan’s border with Afghanistan, rose to at least 54 people, Shaukat Abbas, a senior officer at the provincial police’s counterterrorism department, said on Monday. The Islamic State affiliate, known as the Islamic State Khorasan, or ISIS-K, claimed on Monday that a suicide bomber had carried out the attack, characterizing it as part of the group’s war against democracy as a system of government, according to the SITE Intelligence Group. The blast was among the deadliest terrorist attacks in months in Pakistan, where some militant groups operating along the border with Afghanistan have become more active over the past year. The rise in violence represents a grim shift: Since 2014, when security forces carried out a major military operation to flush militants out of Pakistan, the country has experienced relative calm.

Persons: Shaukat Abbas Organizations: Islamic State, SITE Intelligence Group Locations: South Asia, Pakistan, Bajaur, Pakistan’s, Afghanistan, State Khorasan

☆ At Least 35 Dead in Blast at Political Rally in Pakistan
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-30 | by ( Christina Goldbaum | More About Christina Goldbaum | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

An explosion at a political rally on Sunday in northwest Pakistan killed at least 35 people and injured 200 more, officials said, the latest sign of the deteriorating security situation in Pakistan, where some militant groups have become more active over the past two years since finding a haven in neighboring Afghanistan under the Taliban administration there. The blast occurred about 4 p.m. in Bajaur, a district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province near Pakistan’s border with Afghanistan, said Feroz Jamal, the provincial information minister. It targeted a political rally organized by Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl, an Islamist party that is part of the governing coalition in Pakistan. A state of emergency has been imposed in the hospitals in Peshawar, the provincial capital. A local leader of the political party who was onstage when the explosion occurred, Maulana Ziaullah, was among those killed.

Persons: Feroz Jamal, Fazl, Mr, Jamal, Maulana Ziaullah Organizations: Jamiat Ulema, Islamic Locations: Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bajaur, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province, Pakistan’s, Peshawar, Islamic State, Jamiat

☆ Taliban Shut Beauty Salons, One of Afghan Women’s Last Public Spaces
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-25 | by ( Christina Goldbaum | More About Christina Goldbaum | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

All women’s beauty salons in Afghanistan were set to close on Tuesday, officials said, as part of a Taliban administration announcement early this month that the women-only spaces were forbidden under Shariah law and caused economic hardship for grooms’ families during wedding celebrations. The closing of the salons — one of the few public places left in Afghanistan where women could congregate outside the home — represents another grim milestone for women’s rights in Afghanistan. Since the Taliban seized power in August 2021, the government has steadily rolled back women’s rights, barring women and girls from most public spaces, from traveling any significant distance without a male relative and from attending school beyond sixth grade. The initial announcement ordering salons to close prompted a rare public protest early this month in Kabul, the capital, where dozens of salon owners and beauticians marched down the street while holding signs opposing the ban. Security forces with the Taliban administration broke up the protest using fire hoses and shot weapons into the air to disperse the crowd.

Persons: ’, Sadeq Akif Muhajir, beauticians Organizations: Taliban administration’s Ministry, Security Locations: Afghanistan, Kabul

☆ A Rubik’s Cube, Thick Socks and Giddy Anticipation: The Last Hours of the Titan
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-02 | by ( John Branch | Christina Goldbaum | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: 1 min

The last time Christine Dawood saw her husband, Shahzada, and their son, Suleman, they were specks on the North Atlantic, bobbing on a floating platform about 400 miles from land. It was Father’s Day, June 18, and she watched from the support ship as they climbed into a 22-foot submersible craft called Titan. Divers closed them inside by tightening a ring of bolts as the craft rolled on the waves about 13,000 feet above the 111-year-old wreckage of the Titanic. Shahzada had a Nikon camera, eager to capture the view of the seafloor through Titan’s single porthole. “He was like a vibrating toddler,” said Christine, who stayed on the support ship at the surface with the couple’s daughter, Alina.

Persons: Christine Dawood, Shahzada, Suleman, ”, Christine, Alina Organizations: Divers, Nikon

☆ In These Corners of Kabul, Western Influences Live On
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-29 | by ( Christina Goldbaum | Jim Huylebroek | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

There’s a glimmer of the old Kabul hiding in the new one — if you know where to look. It’s there in the crowded snooker halls where young men in jeans hover around velvet tables and yell “nice shot” in English. It’s in coffee shops where women sip on cappuccinos, their robe-like abayas concealing skinny jeans, as a Taylor Swift tune softly radiates from the speakers. Since the Taliban toppled the Western-backed government nearly two years ago, the group has erased most obvious vestiges of the American nation-building project in Afghanistan. Religious scholars and strict interpretations of Shariah law replaced judges and state penal codes.

Persons: Taylor Swift Organizations: FIFA Locations: Kabul, American, Afghanistan

☆ The Dark Incentives That Led to a Refugee Tragedy
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-23 | by ( Amanda Taub | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

Hundreds of people may have died last week in the Mediterranean, after a boat overloaded with migrants, including many children, capsized and sank. It was one of the deadliest migrant disasters in years. And, indeed, Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president, said Greece’s border enforcement was Europe’s “shield,” because its harsh tactics prevent migrants from reaching E.U. “This border is not only a Greek border, it is also a European border,” she said after Greece used tear gas to repel hundreds of people who were trying to cross over from Turkey. The European Union has gone to even greater extremes to deter migrants.

Persons: Christina Goldbaum, Zia Ur, Rehman, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, Ursula von der Leyen, Frontex Organizations: European Union, Times, European Commission, European, Human Rights Watch Locations: Bandli, Pakistan, Kashmir, Italy, Greece, E.U, European, ”, Turkey, European Union, Libyan, Libya

☆ ‘Like Doomsday’: How Hope of a Better Life Ended on a Boat in the Mediterranean
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-21 | by ( Christina Goldbaum | Zia Ur-Rehman | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Perhaps no two in the group were closer, though, than the cousins, Mr. Wazir and Mr. Salam. The youngest of seven brothers, Mr. Wazir earned a reputation as a rambunctious student who made friends easily. Mr. Salam was quieter, but gained fame in the regional cricket league, where he earned the nickname “Jayasuriya” — after a famous Sri Lankan cricketer. Mr. Wazir left for Saudi Arabia, seeking work as a day laborer. Mr. Salam submitted military enlistment papers, encouraged by his father, a retired low-ranking officer.

Persons: Muhammad Yasir, Muhammad Aslam, Shifaat Ali, Wazir, Salam, “ Jayasuriya ” — Organizations: league Locations: Bandli, Europe, Libya, Sri, Saudi Arabia

☆ Pakistan Declares Day of Mourning for Migrant Ship Disaster Off Greece
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-19 | by ( Christina Goldbaum | Salman Masood | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif of Pakistan declared Monday a day of mourning for Pakistanis who died after a fishing boat crowded with migrants capsized off the coast of Greece last week, and ordered a crackdown on the people involved in trafficking Pakistanis to Europe. That would make the tragedy among the deadliest of its kind. At least 104 Pakistanis were confirmed to be among those killed, according to the Pakistani police, though officials expect the toll from the disaster to rise. Many of the missing were from the Pakistani-administered part of Kashmir, the region long contested between India and Pakistan, and nearby in Punjab, Pakistan’s most populous province. Mr. Sharif, the Pakistani prime minister, said on Twitter on Sunday that law-enforcement agencies had been asked “to tighten the noose around individuals involved in the heinous act of human smuggling.” He also announced a committee to investigate people-trafficking networks.

Persons: Shehbaz Sharif, Sharif, “ Organizations: Twitter Locations: Pakistan, Greece, Europe, Kashmir, India, Punjab, Pakistan’s

☆ The Taliban Government Runs on WhatsApp. There’s Just One Problem.
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-17 | by ( Christina Goldbaum | Safiullah Padshah | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Late one night two months ago, a team of Taliban security officers assembled on the outskirts of Afghanistan’s capital to prepare for a raid on an Islamic State hide-out. He grabbed his colleagues’ phones and called their superiors, who insisted they had sent him the location pin of the target to his WhatsApp. There was just one problem: WhatsApp had blocked his account to comply with American sanctions. “The only way we communicate is WhatsApp — and I didn’t have access,” said Mr. Inqayad, 25, whom The New York Times has followed since the Taliban seized power in August 2021. Those interruptions also underscore the far-reaching consequences of international sanctions on a government that has become among the most isolated in the world.

Persons: Habib Rahman Inqayad, WhatsApp, —, ”, Inqayad Organizations: New York Times Locations: Afghanistan’s, State

☆ Droves of Imran Khan’s Allies Defect as Military Ramps Up Crackdown
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-14 | by ( Salman Masood | Christina Goldbaum | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Throngs of supporters of former Prime Minister Imran Khan have been arrested. Key allies have resigned from his party, saying they had been threatened with criminal charges and arrests. As political tensions between Mr. Khan and the Pakistani government have flared in recent weeks and sparked violent nationwide protests, the country’s powerful military has responded by launching a chilling campaign against Mr. Khan’s supporters that aims to hollow out his political party ahead of general elections this fall. The pressure campaign has begun to chip away at Mr. Khan’s momentum, analysts say — the military’s most forceful effort yet to disempower the former leader who was removed from office last year. It’s the latest move in the Pakistani military’s standard playbook to sideline politicians who have fallen out of its favor and preserve its iron hold on the country’s politics.

Persons: Imran Khan, Khan, Khan’s Organizations: Media, Mr

This episode contains descriptions of violence. In the two years since the United States pulled out of Afghanistan, the Taliban has shut women and girls out of public life. Christina Goldbaum, a correspondent in the Kabul bureau for The New York Times, traveled across Afghanistan to talk to women about how they’re managing the changes. What she found was not what she had expected.

Persons: Christina Goldbaum Organizations: The New York Times Locations: United States, Afghanistan, Kabul

☆ Pakistan’s Powerful Military Faces New Resistance From Courts
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-31 | by ( Christina Goldbaum | Salman Masood | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

For most of Pakistan’s eight-decade history, its courts were largely aligned with the country’s powerful military. In recent months, as former Prime Minister Imran Khan has clashed with the military and current civilian government, the courts have issued ruling after ruling that have thwarted what many consider attempts by the military to sideline Mr. Khan from politics. That defiance was highlighted earlier this month, when shortly after the authorities arrested Mr. Khan in a corruption inquiry, the courts declared his arrest unlawful, ordered his release and granted him bail. It is a striking shift in Pakistan, where the military has long acted as the country’s ultimate political power broker: Directly ruling for over half of the country’s existence and acting as the veiled power behind civilian governments. And as the courts strike out on their own, they are injecting even more uncertainty into an already volatile political climate.

Persons: Imran Khan, Khan, Mr Locations: Pakistan

☆ At Least Three Are Killed in Clashes on Iranian-Afghan Border
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-28 | by ( Christina Goldbaum | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

At least three people were killed and several others injured after clashes broke out along the Iranian-Afghan border on Saturday night, according to Iranian state media and an Afghan official, escalating tensions between the two countries amid a heated dispute over water rights in recent weeks. At least two Iranian border guards were killed in the fighting, which began around noon on Saturday and ended after six hours along the southwestern border of Afghanistan, according to Iranian state media and Afghan news reports. One soldier with the Taliban administration in Afghanistan was also killed, the Afghan Ministry of Interior said. An official in southeastern Iran said that calm had returned to the border area on Saturday night, according to Iranian state media. The mouth of the river is along the border in southwestern Afghanistan and southeastern Iran, where the clashes took place.

☆ Pakistan’s Military, Once a ‘Sacred Cow,’ Comes Under Attack by Protesters
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-10 | by ( Christina Goldbaum | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

A mass of protesters pushing through the gates of the national army headquarters. An angry mob setting a senior military official’s residence aflame. Even under civilian governments, military leaders have kept an iron — if cloaked — grip on power, ushering in politicians they favored and pushing out those who stepped out of line. When politicians or other civilians complained, it was almost always in code, speaking vaguely of “the establishment” or “the sacred cow,” rather than calling out the country’s military or its powerful Inter-Services Intelligence agency explicitly. They knew what could happen if they went further: disappearances, arrests, lives in exile.

☆ Imran Khan, Pakistan’s Ex-Leader, Is Arrested
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-09 | by ( Christina Goldbaum | Salman Masood | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Pakistan’s ousted prime minister, Imran Khan, was arrested on Tuesday in a major escalation of a political crisis that raises the prospect of mass unrest by his steadfast supporters. The crisis has been building for months as Mr. Khan has openly challenged the Pakistan military and the current government of conspiring against him. Mr. Khan, who was removed from office in a parliamentary no-confidence vote in April last year, is facing dozens of court cases on charges that include terrorism and corruption. The arrest instantly intensified a showdown between the current government and Mr. Khan, a populist former cricket star, who has staged a political comeback in the months since his removal from office. His party has drawn tens of thousands to political rallies across the country, at which Mr. Khan and others have called for fresh elections and accused Pakistan’s powerful military establishment of orchestrating his ouster.

☆ In Pakistan, Economic Crisis Mutes Ramadan Celebrations
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-17 | by ( Zia Ur-Rehman | Christina Goldbaum | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

They swell through the day as hundreds of men and women swathed in bright purple and pink scarves wait outside the charity’s gates in Karachi, Pakistan. Many sit for hours, desperate to collect enough flour, rice, sugar and cooking oil to break their daily fast for the holy month of Ramadan. “It is the most expensive and unaffordable Ramadan of my life.”Across Pakistan, the season of Ramadan — a time of daily fasting and nightly feasts with family — is in full swing. But this year, an economic crisis that has sent the price of goods soaring to record highs has muted celebrations for millions of families struggling to buy the dates, rice and meat needed to break their daily fast. The South Asian nation — home to more than 230 million — is facing one of the most daunting economic challenges of its history.

Life has become solitary confinement.” Some women went into hiding, fearing retribution after the Taliban seized power. When the Taliban returned to power in Afghanistan in August 2021, women were among the most profoundly affected. A Wrenching Change Afifa, 47, wishes more Afghan men would fight for women’s rights KABUL, Afghanistan — Walk around the capital, Kabul, and it often feels as if women have been airbrushed out of the city. When the Taliban seized power, girls’ schools remained open in a kind of limbo — neither officially sanctioned nor forbidden — for months. Zubaida, 20, teaches high school girls in secret “Regimes come and go all the time in Afghanistan.

QADIS, Afghanistan — When the temperatures plunged far below freezing in Niaz Mohammad’s village last month, the father of three struggled to keep his family warm. One particularly cold night, he piled every stick and every shrub he had collected into their small wood stove. He scavenged for trash that might burn, covered the windows with plastic tarps and held his 2-month-old son close to his chest. Ice crept across the room: It covered the windows, then the walls, then the thick red blanket wrapped around Mr. Mohammad’s wailing son. “The cold took him,” Mr. Mohammad, 30, told visiting journalists for The New York Times, describing the details of that horrible night.

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