Taliban regime under siege, within and without

Afghanistan is far from stable, more than a year after the Taliban's takeover of Kabul in August 2021. As various reports from the United Nations Security Council's (UNSC) sanctions monitoring team concerning Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), Al-Qaeda, and other associated individuals and entities have shown, transnational jihadi groups have had more space to operate following the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan. This is a worrying situation for many neighbouring countries, especially Pakistan, where the Taliban victory has strengthened the position of banned groups like the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), as outlined in a previous edition of Himal Briefs. But this is equally threatening for the Afghan Taliban regime itself, which came to power promising stability and peace to its people. As it stands, the regime is under attack from groups that rival it both ideologically and politically.

On 5 September, 2022, a suicide bomb attack at the Russian embassy in Kabul killed at least six people, including two embassy staff. The attack was later claimed by the Islamic State-Khorasan (IS-K). This was the first major attack on foreign interests in Kabul after August 2021, which demonstrated that the IS-K is active in Kabul and is on a mission to disrupt the stability that the Afghan Taliban initially promised.