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Taliban Offensive: A Test of Survival for Afghanistan
April 18, 2016 | Abdul Ahad Bahrami
Shortly after announcement of the so-called Omari Operation by the Taliban, the group has launched a major offensive in Kunduz province opening different fronts aimed at taking...
Environmental Management!
April 18, 2016 | Mohd. Mehdi Rezaie
A silent disaster making itself gradually felt all across Afghanistan is an environmental one. Afghanistan faces an acute environmental crisis due to decades of war and...
The Endless Suffering of Women
April 17, 2016 | Hujjatullah Zia
The vulnerability of Afghan women is beyond doubt. Their life is fraught with manifold problems. The traditional frames of mind and cultural taboos curtail their freedoms to...
Poverty Beyond the Numbers
April 17, 2016 | Julia Corvalan
What is poverty? For decades, we have defined it with a number, which the World Bank currently puts at a personal income of less than $1.90 per day. But a single number fails...
Struggle to Empower Women
April 16, 2016 | Mohd. Mehdi Rezaie
women rights” is the new catchphrase in the post-Taliban Afghanistan,. Improving the conditions and social standing of women in today’s Afghanistan has found pious...
What’s Wrong with Negative Rates?
April 16, 2016 | Joseph E. Stiglitz
I wrote at the beginning of January that economic conditions this year were set to be as weak as in 2015, which was the worst year since the global financial crisis erupted in 2008...
Prioritizing High-Quality Education
April 14, 2016 | Mehdi Rezaie
The new educational year in Afghanistan just started with the advent of the new solar calendar year. Education Minister, Hanif Balkhi, expressed his commitment to improving the...
Militancy – an Interminable Challenge
April 14, 2016 | Hujjatullah Zia
The Taliban regime ruled Afghanistan about five years. Throughout this period, the international aid community, including the United Nations, tried with varying levels of success to...
The Onset of Taliban Spring Offensive
April 13, 2016 | Abdul Ahad Bahrami
The Taliban announced its annual spring offensive codenamed ‘Omari operation’. According to a Taliban statement, the operation aims to capture new territories, target...
Europe’s Rule-of-Law Crisis
April 13, 2016 | Guy Verhofstadt
From the rubble of two world wars, European countries came together to launch what would become the world’s largest experiment in unification and cooperative, shared...
The BSA and Prospect of Security in Afghanistan
April 12, 2016 | Abdul Ahad Bahrami
A robust military partnership between the US and Afghanistan is crucial for the ongoing campaign against the Taliban insurgency. The government of Afghanistan hopes the...
Talks about Peace Talks
April 12, 2016 | Hujjatullah Zia
The resumption of peace process between Afghanistan and the Taliban elements is hotly debated. The four-nation group, which is comprised of Pakistan, Afghanistan, China and...
The Prospects and Challenges of Economic Development
April 11, 2016 | Abdullah Ludeen
Economic development from a policy perspective can be defined as efforts that seek to improve the economic well-being and quality of life for a community by creating and retaining...
Women Condition has to be Changed!
April 11, 2016 | Dilawar Sherzai
The radical and conservative elements in Afghan society have always been against modern education. They have always taken acute steps to stop its growth in this society...
Migration Crisis Should Be Tackled
April 10, 2016 | Hujjatullah Zia
Political and financial plights have forced Afghan people to seek refuge in foreign countries and migration remains a serious issue. The escalated violence and emergence of the...
Will Britain Choose Irrelevance?
April 10, 2016 | Dambisa Moyo
When voters in the United Kingdom go to the polls on June 23 to decide whether their country should leave the European Union, the issues they will have to reckon with will include...
Hizb-e Islami’s Motives for Making Peace
April 09, 2016 | Abdul Ahad Bahrami
As peace talks with the Taliban stalled, progresses in the talks with the Hizb-e Islami of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar seem to come as a minimal success for the government’s...
Realism for Europe and Turkey
April 09, 2016 | Joschka Fischer
Relations between Europe and Turkey have long been characterized by a deep contradiction. Whereas security cooperation (especially during the Cold War) and economic ties have...
Chaotic Policy on Refugee Crisis
April 07, 2016 | Abdul Ahad Bahrami
The situation for Afghan refugees – who are stranded in countries on the way to Europe or already have reached in the European countries – have been consistently changing...
The Unmitigated Militancy in Afghanistan
April 07, 2016 | Hujjatullah Zia
Ushering in heavy attacks, the Taliban inflicted indescribable casualties upon our nation. Annual fatalities of Afghan civilians and security forces have compounded in...
Kankor and the Challenges of Afghanistan’s Higher Education
April 06, 2016 | Abdul Ahad Bahrami
University entry exam (Kankor) and its administration have evolved into symbolizing higher education in Afghanistan and the challenges involved with a major part of it...
Europe’s Generational War
April 06, 2016 | Harold James
Throughout the industrialized world, governments are rushing to hand out money to the elderly. Germany’s government has not only reversed an increase in the retirement...
Tolerance - A Panacea for Troubled Societies
April 05, 2016 | Hujjatullah Zia
Tolerance means not opposing one’s beliefs or behaviors maturely, which are disagreeable, despite having the authority and free will. Tolerance is based on particularly...
Learning Without Theory
April 05, 2016 | Ricardo Hausmann
How can we improve the state of the world? How can we make countries more competitive, growth more sustainable and inclusive, and genders more equal? One way is to have a...
Social Justice!
April 04, 2016 | Asmatyari
You are frequently subjected to grave discriminations; given you are ethnic minorities, presumed inferior sex, religious minority or a teenaged youth. The fallacious and...
The Online Fight Against ISIS
April 04, 2016 | Colin P. Clarke and Isaac R. Porche III
Even as the United States and its allies carry out aerial bombardments in Iraq and Syria, their target, the Islamic State (ISIS), may be preparing to retaliate on another....
Impacts of Afghanistan-Pakistan Relations on Peace Efforts
April 03, 2016 | Abdul Ahad Bahrami
Afghanistan and Pakistan are once again stepping back from a common ground on peace effort that was established over months of mutual works through the four-nation peace...
Militancy – A Menace to Freedom
April 03, 2016 | Hujjatullah Zia
A surge in terror has put the rights and liberty of the public at stake. Life is very cheap and one’s blood is spilt for nothing and without an iota of mercy...
The Growing Discontents among Afghan Political Class
April 02, 2016 | Abdul Ahad Bahrami
A spate of resignations of high-ranking officials from their government posts in recently seems to be appearing as a new challenge for the National Unity Government...
When Things Fall Apart
April 02, 2016 | Anatole Kaletsky
All over the world today, there is a sense of the end of an era, a deep foreboding about the disintegration of previously stable societies. In the immortal lines of W.B...
Europe Versus the Islamic State
March 31, 2016 | Dominique Moisi
After the November 13 terrorist attacks in Paris that left 130 dead, I wrote a commentary entitled “We Are At War” – and faced considerable criticism from...
Deadly Attack in Pakistan
March 31, 2016 | Hujjatullah Zia
Not a week goes by in which, a report about an atrocity or attack in Afghanistan or Pakistan is flashed on the news. We are then routinely bombarded from all sides as to...
The Issue of Human Rights
March 30, 2016 | Hujjatullah Zia
Human rights are commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being and which are...
Bracing for a Heightened Taliban Insurgency
March 30, 2016 | Abdul Ahad Bahrami
As Afghan security officials were briefing MPs on Monday, March 28. Taliban sent a loud message by firing four rockets at the parliament’s new compound, signaling...
The Lingering Immigration Crisis of Afghanistan
March 29, 2016 | Abdul Ahad Bahrami
Thousands of Afghan refugees are stranded at Greece-Macedonia border while thousands more are awaiting forced deportation to Turkey after a recently-agreed deal between the EU and the Turkish government came into force...