Ron Synovitz is a senior correspondent for RFE/RL.
As the Taliban consolidates its control over Afghanistan, its military victory is influencing the political dynamics of neighboring Pakistan.
The Taliban is forcing Afghans to do manual labor in exchange for food aid donated by other countries. Now the regime is expanding its "work-for-food" program by using international humanitarian aid to pay public sector workers.
Despite claims of being more moderate than its previous regime, the Taliban is treating musicians with the same disdain it had shown in the 1990s when it had banned music as "un-Islamic."
The mass protests across Kazakhstan in recent days have no identifiable leader. But RFE/RL’s interviews with demonstrators reveal a multitude of complaints from activists who feel they have no political voice under the rule of President Qasym-Zhomart Toqaev.
For 20 years, the West had a firm foothold in Afghanistan. Now, with the Taliban back in power, the United States and its allies have retreated. Seeking to fill void are regional powers China and Russia. Some analysts say the region threatens to become an anti-Western hub.
Nine Afghan boxers who traveled to Serbia to compete in an international tournament last month are refusing to return to their homeland, fearing they will be targeted by the Taliban regime.
The Taliban has taken control of Afghanistan’s Independent Bar Association and declared that only Taliban-approved lawyers can work in its Islamic courts. The move has raised deep concerns about the impartiality and fairness of criminal trials under the Taliban regime.
Tens of thousands of Afghan teachers have not been paid their salaries since the Taliban seized power in August. As they struggle to survive by other means, many Afghan schools now lack enough teachers to instruct boys or girls.
From crippling droughts to deadly flash floods, Afghans are being hit hard by changes in rainfall and other weather patterns blamed on global climate change.
Fresh destruction at the site of the Bamiyan Buddhas comes despite a Taliban vow to protect all of Afghanistan's historic relics.
Afghan women who have been isolated in their homes since the Taliban seized power in August say they feel like they have been sentenced to a life in prison.
Afghan farmers who are in need of humanitarian aid are being forced by the cash-strapped Taliban regime to pay an Islamic charity tax.
Ahmad Zia became a water bearer for Afghan soldiers at the age of 12 after the Taliban killed his father and three uncles in 2019. Now his family of 30 does not even have that meager income.
Afghanistan classical music traditions are endangered by Taliban bans on singing or playing musical instruments. But groups that perform Taliban-approved “music-less songs” are proliferating.
The way Islamic law is interpreted and implemented by Afghanistan’s Taliban-led government differs from Shari’a in other Muslim-majority countries.
Prosecutors who worked for Afghanistan's ousted central government say they are now being threatened by the criminals they helped convict. The threats come after the Taliban emptied the country's jails during their takeover of the country in August.
As a guerrilla insurgency, the Taliban was able to conquer Afghanistan. Governing the country is the difficult part.
Taliban shadow courts established in the past two decades are poised to become Afghanistan’s new state courts -- issuing decisions under the militant Islamists’ strict interpretation of Islamic law.
Decisions now being made by the Taliban on a new governing structure will determine whether the movement remains united or splinters into regional Taliban fiefdoms.
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