Ahmad Shuja is a writer, blogger and analyst. He writes primarily about development, security, nation-building, policy, democratization and issues pertaining to the Afghanistan-Pakistan region. He is an assistant editor at Iran Times, a contributor to the Huffington Post, and maintains his personal blog. He has appeared on the BBC, Al-Jazeera English, FOX News, the Kojo Nnamdi Show, TOLO News, Voice of America and other outlets. His day job is with the the Foundation for Afghanistan, a DC- and Kabul-based nonprofit organization that works to build human capacity in Afghanistan. Ahmad tweets at @AhmadShuja
This attack is an assault on the already-shrinking space considered safe by international civilian personnel – dignitaries, diplomats, consultants, aid workers, journalists, others.
Former head of Afghanistan’s intelligence service, Amrullah Saleh, wrote an article on Bloomberg.com tacitly agreeing to the idea of negotiations with the Taliban and, rather curiously, calling for a truth commission as a way of reconciliation.
The violence perpetrated by the Taliban has not only caused serious deterioration of security but also dangerously skewed the focus of US aid projects in Afghanistan.
A former National Security Council member under both George W. Bush and President Obama, Douglas A. Ollivant, writes an op-ed in the Washington Post that is symptomatic of why the US is still not getting its longest war right and how Afghanistan is still misunderstood, even by high-level policymakers.
Local sources have confirmed to me that clashes have broken out in the Maidan-Wardak province of Afghanistan over grazing rights as Kuchi nomads begin their annual migration. In the past, these localized ethnic conflicts have had serious national -- and even international -- implications.
