Latest news with #Najibullah
The Star
05-06-2025
- Business
- The Star
Afghans struggle to mark Aidil Adha amid US sanctions
A young butcher holding a sheep waits for customers at a market ahead of Aidil Adha in Kabul, Afghanistan, June 4, 2025. - Xinhua KABUL: As Muslims around the world prepare to celebrate Aidil Adha, or the Feast of Sacrifice, millions in Afghanistan are grappling with deepening poverty, hunger and economic despair. Najibullah, a 45-year-old Kabul resident, travelled from northern Kabul to a livestock market in the southern part of the city in hopes of purchasing a sheep for the traditional Aidil Adha sacrifice. "I arrived here at seven in the morning to buy a sheep, but a 20-km animal costs around 13,000 afghani (roughly US$186). We can't afford it," he told Xinhua in frustration. Najibullah, the sole provider for a family of five, pointed to frozen Afghan assets abroad as a key factor behind the crisis. "If the Afghan people's frozen assets were released, there would be more job opportunities. More construction projects would take place. People could find work, and our lives would be better," he said. He estimates that nearly 70 per cent of Afghans are unable to afford livestock for Aidil Adha due to ongoing US sanctions. "Most people's tables are empty because they don't have enough money," Najibullah added as he returned home without making a purchase. Instead of serving lamb, he plans to offer dried fruits to guests this year. The United Nations has warned that nearly half of Afghanistan's population, about 22.9 million people, will require humanitarian assistance by 2025 as the country struggles to meet both chronic and acute needs. Naqibullah, a butcher from eastern Wardak Province, travels to Kabul annually ahead of Aidil Adha to earn a living. "In the past, business was booming, but now, there is barely any work and the job market is taking its last breaths," he explained. This young butcher visits the market daily, looking for customers until the evening; however, there are no signs of improvement. "This year, our economy is so weak that I can't afford to make a sacrifice myself. Even some of our neighbours can't afford dinner," Naqibullah lamented. Afghans continue to voice frustration over mounting unemployment and worsening poverty, as approximately US$9 billion of Afghanistan's assets were frozen by the United States in August 2021. While a few buyers are seen browsing livestock markets in Kabul, many livestock farmers have brought their animals from neighbouring provinces, hoping to sell them. Mohammad Younis, a veteran livestock trader in Kabul with a decade of experience, said this year's Aidil Adha market has been the worst he's seen. "People want to buy cattle or sheep, but prices are too high and their wallets are empty, so they leave empty-handed," he said, anxiously scanning the market for potential customers. Younis blamed the dire situation in part on US policies. He believes decades of conflict and foreign occupation have devastated Afghanistan's economic foundations. As in other Muslim countries, Aidil Adha in Afghanistan is traditionally celebrated with animal sacrifices and family visits. But for many this year, it has become a painful reminder of hardship rather than a celebration. Shakir Yaqubi, an Afghan economist, said that US financial sanctions have crippled Afghanistan's trade and frozen development. "This Aidil Adha, for many Afghan families, is a day of economic struggle rather than a festive occasion," he noted. "Without coordinated actions from the government or international community, poverty will deepen, and social divisions will grow." - Xinhua
The Independent
30-04-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
‘I worked for the British in Kabul embassy for 18 years. Let me reunite with my sons'
A security guard who worked for the British embassy in Kabul for almost two decades is calling on the Home Office to help him reunite his family after he was evacuated during the Taliban takeover, but his two eldest sons were forced to stay. Hamidullah Fahim and his wife Zaghona were brought to the UK with two young children in December 2023, on a dedicated scheme for employees of the British Embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan. However he couldn't bring his two eldest sons, who are now 21 and 22, because they are over the age of 18. Mr Fahim is now pleading with the Home Office to be reunited with them in the UK. Though the family applied for Najibullah and Hasibullah to be evacuated to the UK from Afghanistan, where they currently live with their grandmother, their applications have been rejected twice by officials. Mr Fahim said that while the family tries to speak to the two eldest sons regularly on the phone, it has been hard to be apart. 'It has affected them and us both. We want to do whatever we can to be reunited with them and to let the Home Office know of the injustice that has been carried out in our case. 'It is especially difficult for our young children who get upset whenever we speak to them, and for my wife who is struggling a lot', he explained. His wife Zaghona is struggling to sleep, and suffers from nightmares where she sees her son being harmed, a report from a social worker found. She can be withdrawn from the family and is often tearful, according to the assessment. Before the Taliban takeover, Hasibullah and Najibullah never lived independently and were dependent on their parents. Their parents and two young siblings, aged 13 and 15, were evacuated to Pakistan in early 2023 and left the eldest sons behind in the hope that when they got to the UK they would be able to apply for reunification. The family of six, including the eldest sons, were told to come to Kabul airport during the chaos of the 2021 evacuation, along with hundreds of other GardaWorld staff who had worked at the British embassy, with the view that they would all be brought to the UK. However, they were told to leave the airport after a suicide bomb blast prevented their evacuation. They were then moved on to the Afghan Citizens Resettlement Scheme (ACRS), which didn't include Najibullah and Hasibullah. Mr Fahim worked as a security guard at the British embassy in Kabul from 2004 to 2021 and therefore qualified for pathway three of this scheme. Under the terms of the scheme, an eligible person can only bring children under 18 with them to the UK. The Foreign Office, who run pathway three of this scheme, offered the family the chance to submit a separate application for their two eldest sons but Mr Fahim's attempts to take advantage of this have not been successful, compounded by the fact that the family don't speak English. Nick Beales, from charity Ramfel who are supporting the family, said that the father had 'persistently sought to communicate with the FCDO about sponsoring his children to relocate to the UK, but when these avenues hit a brick wall they had to proceed with making an application to the Home Office'. In the UK, the family do not have refugee status and therefore are not normally eligible to sponsor family members under the Refugee Family Reunion policy. Their applications have so far been rejected twice by the Home Office. One of the older sons, Najibullah, said: 'Before our parents left we had a good life, we used to study and go to school... but currently we are not studying and we don't have money to do that. When they left, I was extremely upset, I became very unwell and they gave me IV fluids, but I have hope that in future things will get better and we will be able to reunite with our parents.' Masuda, who is 15, said that she dreams that she will be reunited with her brothers one day. She explained to a social worker: 'In Afghanistan we used to make a slide out of the snow – we used to play together, it was so fun. 'It's not good being separated especially when I see my mum crying. It affects her quite a lot.' Mr Beales, from Ramfel, added: 'The Fahim family were promised safety in the UK after their 18 years of service to the British Embassy, but the British government have instead abandoned them. At Ramfel, we see time and again how families on the Arap and Acrs schemes are denied family reunification, despite successive governments repeatedly falsely claiming that Afghans can safely reach the UK. The government's new Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill does nothing to address these failures, and focuses exclusively on yet more so-called deterrence measures. New immigration legislation should instead look at expanding safe routes so that families can swiftly reunite and rebuild their lives in the UK.' A Home Office spokesperson said: 'It is our longstanding policy not to comment on individual cases.'
Express Tribune
27-04-2025
- Express Tribune
Ex-Taliban commander pleads guilty in US
A former commander in the Taliban has pleaded guilty to taking an American journalist and two Afghan nationals hostage in Afghanistan and Pakistan in 2008 and 2009, the US Justice Department said on Friday. Haji Najibullah, 49, an Afghan national, who was charged in 2020 with kidnapping David Rohde, a former Reuters correspondent, faces life in prison. He previously pleaded guilty in the case. Najibullah also changed his plea to guilty in a case related to the deaths of US troops in Afghanistan between 2007 and 2009. The Justice Department pointed to examples of Taliban fighters -- under Najibullah's leadership - targeting the US military in Afghanistan.
CBS News
26-04-2025
- Politics
- CBS News
Ex-Taliban commander pleads guilty in killings of U.S. soldiers and kidnapping of journalists
A former Taliban commander pleaded guilty Friday to providing weapons and other support for attacks that killed American soldiers and for key roles in the 2008 gunpoint kidnapping of a reporter for The New York Times and another journalist. Speaking through an interpreter, Haji Najibullah, 49, entered the plea in Manhattan federal court to providing material support for acts of terrorism and conspiring to take hostages. "Najibullah committed his crimes in Afghanistan over 15 years ago, and now faces justice in an American courtroom," said U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton in a news statement. The bearded Najibullah, wearing a black skull cap over his shaved head, told Judge Katherine Polk Failla that he provided material support including weapons and himself to the Taliban from 2007 to 2009, knowing that his support "would be used to attack and kill United States soldiers occupying Afghanistan." "As a result of material support I provided to the Taliban, U.S. soldiers were killed," Najibullah said. He said his material support also included his role as a Taliban commander in Afghanistan's Wardak Province, "where the fighters under me were prepared to, and sometimes did, conduct attacks against U.S. soldiers and their allies using suicide bombers, automatic weapons, improvised explosive devices and rocket propelled grenades." Najibullah said he also participated in the hostage taking of David Rohde "and his companions" so demands could be made for ransom and for the release of Taliban prisoners held by the U.S. government. They forced the hostages to hike across the border from Afghanistan to Pakistan, where they were detained for seven months. "I created proof-of-life videos of David Rohde and his companions in which they were forced to convey the Taliban's demands," he said. The former Times reporter and Afghan journalist Tahir Ludin were abducted when they were on their way to interview a Taliban leader. Both men made a dramatic escape from a Taliban-controlled compound in Pakistan's tribal areas more than seven months after their Nov. 10, 2008, kidnapping. Their driver, Asadullah Mangal, was a third kidnapping victim. He escaped a few weeks after Ludin and Rohde. Rohde, a Pulitzer Prize winner who now works as senior executive editor for national security at NBC News, attended the plea proceeding. "I am pleased that he admitted his guilt today and grateful to all the U.S. officials who brought him to justice," he said in an email to The Associated Press after his sentencing. "Most of all, my heart goes out to the families of the three U.S. soldiers and the Afghan translator who were killed." In June 2008, fighters under Najibullah's command ambushed and attacked a U.S. military convoy in the vicinity of Wardak Province, according to the Justice Department. Three U.S. Army soldiers: Sergeants First Class Matthew L. Hilton and Joseph A. McKay, and Sergeant Mark Palmateer, and their Afghan interpreter were killed in the attack. Several other servicemembers were also injured in the attack, the DOJ said. After the plea, Najibullah was led from the courtroom in shackles and handcuffs by U.S. marshals to face an Oct. 23 sentencing. Federal sentencing guidelines, as acknowledged by a plea agreement signed by Najibullah and prosecutors, recommend a life prison sentence. New York Times spokesperson Danielle Rhoades Ha expressed gratitude to U.S. authorities for pursuing Najibullah, and she noted the dangers journalists face worldwide. "More than 120 journalists were killed in 2024, the most on record," she said. "Journalists go to dangerous places to uncover the facts that citizens need. Governments can and should protect journalists by investigating all attacks against reporters and publicly condemning threats."
Washington Post
26-04-2025
- Politics
- Washington Post
Ex-Taliban commander pleads guilty in killings of US soldiers and kidnapping of journalists
NEW YORK — A former Taliban commander pleaded guilty Friday to providing weapons and other support for attacks that killed American soldiers and for key roles in the 2008 gunpoint kidnapping of a reporter for The New York Times and another journalist. Speaking through an interpreter, Haji Najibullah entered the plea in Manhattan federal court to providing material support for acts of terrorism and conspiring to take hostages. The bearded Najibullah, wearing a black skull cap over his shaved head, told Judge Katherine Polk Failla that he provided material support including weapons and himself to the Taliban from 2007 to 2009, knowing that his support 'would be used to attack and kill United States soldiers occupying Afghanistan.' 'As a result of material support I provided to the Taliban, U.S. soldiers were killed,' Najibullah said. He said his material support also included his role as a Taliban commander in Afghanistan's Wardak Province, 'where the fighters under me were prepared to, and sometimes did, conduct attacks against U.S. soldiers and their allies using suicide bombers, automatic weapons, improvised explosive devices and rocket propelled grenades.' Najibullah, 49, said he also participated in the hostage taking of David Rohde 'and his companions' so demands could be made for ransom and for the release of Taliban prisoners held by the U.S. government. 'I created proof-of-life videos of David Rohde and his companions in which they were forced to convey the Taliban's demands,' he said. The former Times reporter and Afghan journalist Tahir Ludin were abducted when they were on their way to interview a Taliban leader. Both men made a dramatic escape from a Taliban-controlled compound in Pakistan's tribal areas more than seven months after their Nov. 10, 2008, kidnapping. Their driver, Asadullah Mangal, was a third kidnapping victim. He escaped a few weeks after Ludin and Rohde. Rohde, a Pulitzer Prize winner who now works as senior executive editor for national security at NBC News, attended the plea proceeding. 'I am pleased that he admitted his guilt today and grateful to all the U.S. officials who brought him to justice,' he said in an email to The Associated Press after his sentencing. 'Most of all, my heart goes out to the families of the three U.S. soldiers and the Afghan translator who were killed.' After the plea, Najibullah was led from the courtroom in shackles and handcuffs by U.S. marshals to face an Oct. 23 sentencing. Federal sentencing guidelines, as acknowledged by a plea agreement signed by Najibullah and prosecutors, recommend a life prison sentence. New York Times spokesperson Danielle Rhoades Ha expressed gratitude to U.S. authorities for pursuing Najibullah, and she noted the dangers journalists face worldwide. 'More than 120 journalists were killed in 2024, the most on record,' she said. 'Journalists go to dangerous places to uncover the facts that citizens need. Governments can and should protect journalists by investigating all attacks against reporters and publicly condemning threats.'
