Afghanistan LIVE Updates: Russian NSA to Meet Ajit Doval, PM Modi Today, US in Touch with India Too on Afghan Crisis

Afghanistan News LIVE Updates: Russian Secretary of the Security Council General Nikolay Patrushev, who arrived in Delhi last evening, will meet with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, NSA Doval and External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar around 10 am with focus on developments in Afghanistan. A report in The Hindu stated that American intelligence and security officials is visiting India too. The US delegation led by Chief of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) William Burns will also fly to Pakistan. The report stated that the officials held consultations with National Security Advisor (NSA) Ajit Doval on Tuesday to discuss a number of issues arising from the Afghanistan evacuation effort and Taliban government formation.

The Taliban announced their government on Tuesday, with a UN-blacklisted veteran of the hardline movement in the top role, weeks after they swept to power and toppled the US-backed president. But as the Taliban transitions from militant force to governing power of Afghanistan, security officials grappled with a growing number of protests against its rule, with two people shot dead in the western city of Herat.

Mullah Mohammad Hassan Akhund — a senior minister during the Taliban’s brutal and repressive reign in the 1990s — was appointed acting prime minister, a spokesman said at a press conference in Kabul. The Taliban had promised an inclusive government that would reflect the ethnic makeup of the country, but all the top positions were handed to key leaders from the movement and the Haqqani network — the most violent branch of the Taliban known for devastating attacks.

None of the government appointees were women. “We will try to take people from other parts of the country,” spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said, adding that it was an interim government. Shortly after the new lineup was revealed, Hibatullah Akhundzada, the secretive supreme leader of the Taliban who has never been seen in public, released a statement saying that the new government would “work hard towards upholding Islamic rules and sharia law”.

“The new Taliban, same as the old Taliban,” tweeted Bill Roggio, managing editor of the US-based Long War Journal. Mullah Yaqoob, the son of the Taliban founder and late supreme leader Mullah Omar, was named defence minister, while the position of interior minister was given to Sirajuddin Haqqani, the leader of the Haqqani network.

Taliban co-founder Abdul Ghani Baradar, who oversaw the signing of the US withdrawal agreement, will be a deputy to Hassan. “It’s not at all inclusive, and that’s no surprise whatsoever,” said Michael Kugelman, a South Asia expert at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.

“The Taliban had never indicated that any of its cabinet ministers would include anyone other than themselves.”

With Thanks, Reference to: https://www.news18.com/news/india/afghanistan-taliban-news-live-updates-govt-formation-russia-ajit-doval-us-hassan-akhund-4177280.html#gotobody