Taliban is the richly funded face of Islamic terrorism

Taliban is a terror organization. It believes and propagates an extreme form of Islamic radicalism completely opposed to human sensibilities.

Their idea of Islam is devoid of humanity.

Today, the Taliban has captured Afghanistan in parts and will soon control it in totality while the world watches in horror.

The plight of the people of Afghanistan is because of the poor and ineffective government of Afghanistan and the cowardice of the US government who have left the Afghanis at the mercy of the Taliban terrorist forces.

In 2016, Forbes listed the Taliban as the fifth richest terrorist organization in the list of Top Ten Terror Organisation. It had an annual turnover of USD 400 million.

In 2017-18 it reportedly got 500 million from foreign sources, mostly from the Middle East.

In 2019-20, a NATO Confidential Report obtained by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty pegged the Taliban annual turnover to be at USD 1.6 billion – a 4 times increase since the Forbes report in 2016. It reportedly earned from Mining: $464 million, Drugs: $416 million, Foreign Donations: $240 million, Export: $240 million, Taxes: $160 million (Protection/Extortion money) and Real Estate: $80 million.

The Taliban’s burgeoning financial might could make the militant group immune to pressure from the international community as it negotiates a role in postwar Afghanistan, according to a confidential report commissioned by NATO and obtained by RFE/RL.

The NATO report, written by researcher and journalist Lynne O’Donnell, cautions that the Taliban’s growing financial power could “put it beyond pressure to comply with obligations to cut ties with [Al-Qaeda] and other terrorist groups.”

“Unless global action is taken, the Taliban will remain a hugely wealthy organization, with a self-sustaining funding stream and outside support from regional countries,” NATO report warns.

“Its role as a destabilizing force, not only in South Asia but globally, will only be enhanced by the withdrawal of the United States from the Afghan theater, and its expected return to the power equation in Kabul.”

The illicit opium trade remains a major source of revenue for the Taliban. Around 90 percent of the world’s heroin comes from the Helmand River valley, a Taliban stronghold in southern Afghanistan.

The Taliban taxes poppy farmers and is also involved in the trafficking of narcotics to neighboring countries, from where they end up in Europe and North America.“Yaqoob’s efforts to control and expand the organization’s finances mean that these plans can, according to officials close to him, be bankrolled to the tune of almost $2 billion a year,” says the report.

A UN Security Council report from May 2018 said the “Gulf region also remains important to the Taliban as a location where drug revenue can be laundered” through a “network of individuals, companies, mosques, and madrasas, [and] various charitable foundations.”

The UNSC report opined: “Al-Qaeda remains closely allied with and embedded within the Taliban. The Taliban provide an umbrella group and operating space for about 20 terrorist groups broadly aligned with Al-Qaeda and Taliban objectives. Many of these militants in Afghanistan were displaced by security operations in the tribal areas of Pakistan. Collectively, they add numbers, capability and expertise to the Taliban and often provide training. Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) (listed as Al-Qaeda in Iraq is the exception in this respect; its relationship with the Taliban is mainly adversarial. The total number of foreign terrorist fighters in Afghanistan with all terrorist groups (including ISIL) is estimated at 10,000 to 15,000.”

To prevent Afghanistan from becoming an “ungoverned space for violent jihadism to threaten the region and the rest of the world,” the report says NATO must first act to “stop the Taliban’s wealth-generating activities.

Taliban in Afghanistan means the death to human and women rights in the country.

The underlining principle of the Taliban is a radical and extremist form of governance and people control. It is better to rule with fear than with hope.

No sooner they grabbed power, Taliban had issued a statement ordering local religious leaders to give them a list of girls over 15 years of age and widows under 45.  Media reports stated that the Taliban has promised for them to be married to their fighters and taken to Pakistan’s Waziristan, where they will be converted to Islam and reintegrated.

The Taliban has gained control of many key districts and border posts with Iran, Pakistan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. It reportedly controls most of Afghanistan right now. Today, it entered Kabul.

More than the men. It will be the women that will see the return of the dark days in Afghanistan under the Taliban

The life of women under the brutal Taliban regime in the 1990s was arguably worse than hell. Women were banned from going outside alone. Girls were barred from attending school. Unmarried women were forced to marry fighters. In 2021, it will get worse.

Men in the Taliban believe that are acting out in concurrence with their religious belief. Their Islamic beliefs are radical, extreme, and devoid of human rights towards women.

The Taliban forced women to cover themselves from head to toe, banned them from working outside the home, severely limited girls’ education, and required women to be accompanied by a male relative when they left their homes.

Oppression of women is not a crime to the Taliban but instead, it is considered to be their duty.

Such is the oppression of women that the Taliban has banned shops from selling goods to unaccompanied women. People who break the rules are often punished, including public beatings. This happened in the past and it will happen in the present and future too.

With the return of the Taliban, girls and women can forget about their dreams of an education. The Taliban do not see education as a necessity for a woman. Educating a woman is considered to be ‘Haram’. Education is only allowed up to the fourth grade for a girl child in Afghanistan under the Taliban rule.

According to the Taliban, the freedom gained by women promoted ‘indecency’ and ‘immoral’ behavior. So, while they have no objection to granting women their rights. They want to instill Islamic discipline, that girls can go to school and women to work only if they do not violate Islamic laws.

From 1996 to 2001, public executions, conservative traditional dress codes, and restrictions on the personal liberties of women were commonplace during the Taliban rule. The concept of human rights or women’s rights were alien to the Taliban then and even now I am afraid it will continue to be alien.

Reportedly, the Taliban have distributed leaflets, ordering locals to follow strict rules that are similar to those they imposed on Afghans when they last governed the country.

Taliban co-founder and deputy leader Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar told certain sections of global media that the Taliban believed in peace. He further asserted that the Taliban believes that the genuine Islamic system is the best means for the solution of all issues in Afghanistan. Baradar also assured that the rights of all Afghans including women will be accommodated in that system according to “the glorious religion of Islam” and Afghan traditions.

While being out of power the Taliban strenghtened its relationship with Iran, Russia and now China. The U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) said Iran provides financial, political, training, and material support to the Taliban. Russia on the otherhand said it has established contacts with the Taliban in recent years because of the common threat posed by the Islamic State (IS) militant group in Afghanistan.

While Afghan burns under Islamic extremism and its women become doormats to madmen, it most proflific international proponent and victim of the brutality of Taliban horror Malala Yousuf maintains a stoic silence.

The only solution to the Afghan crisis is to end the Taliban and it Islamic terrorism. We must not negotiate with terrorists.