Taliban

Russia announced its efforts to remove the Taliban from its list of banned terrorist organizations. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov stated on Tuesday that there are crucial matters to address with Afghanistan's Taliban leadership, emphasizing the need for dialogue due to the Taliban's de facto authority in the country, Reuters reported.

PRAGUE - Former Czech President Milos Zeman has reiterated the bombing of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) as well as the withdrawal from Afghanistan and the surrender of power to the Taliban were NATO's two fundamental mistakes.

In a chilling display of authority, the Taliban carried out a double public execution at a stadium in southeastern Afghanistan, shocking thousands of spectators who witnessed the killing of two convicted individuals.

A Taliban official said journalists were committing "a major sin" by taking pictures, Afghan media reported yesterday.

Television and pictures of living things were banned under the previous Taliban rule from 1996 to 2001, but a similar edict has so far not been imposed since authorities took back power in Afghanistan in 2021.

A bomb targeting a polio protection team in northwestern Pakistan Monday killed at least five police officers, officials said.

"A police truck transporting around 25 policemen for anti-polio campaign duties was targeted by an IED (improvised explosive device)," Anwar ul Haq, a senior government official in Bajaur district, told AFP.

In a concerning trend, more than 3,000 Afghan nationals have been repatriated to Kabul from Turkey over the past 20 days, marking a significant uptick in deportation efforts, as reported by Afghan news agency Khaama Press. The head of the Ministry of Refugees' Legal Support Directorate shared this information, revealing that the deportees included seven families and seven children.

Poppy cultivation and opium production have plunged 95 percent in Afghanistan since Taliban authorities banned the crop, according to a U.N. report published Sunday.

Since returning to power in 2021, Taliban authorities have vowed to end illegal drug production in Afghanistan and in April 2022 banned the cultivation of the poppy plant, from which opium and heroin are made.

Pakistan has issued a significant ultimatum, setting November 1, 2023, as the deadline for all undocumented foreigners living in the country to leave or face forced expulsion. This announcement has sent shockwaves through the community of more than 4 million Afghan migrants and refugees residing in Pakistan.

Afghanistan's ruling Taliban government has said it signed seven mining contracts amounting to $6.5 billion in investment, in the biggest such round of deals since seizing power two years ago.

The seven contracts are with locally based companies, many of whom have foreign partners in countries including China, Iran, and Türkiye.

Another group of migrants were detained in Strandzha region on their way to "Trakia" highway, Nova TV reported.

The group is about 40 people - men, women and minor children - who say they are from Afghanistan.

They claim that many other refugees want to go to Germany and France like them.