The US has lifted bounties on three senior Taliban figures, including the interior minister who also heads a powerful network blamed for bloody attacks against Afghanistan’s former Western-backed government, officials in Kabul said Sunday.
Sirajuddin Haqqani, who acknowledged planning a January 2008 attack on the Serena Hotel in Kabul, which killed six people, including US citizen Thor David Hesla, no longer appears on the State Department’s Rewards for Justice website. The FBI website on Sunday still featured a wanted poster for him.
Interior Ministry spokesman Abdul Mateen Qani said the US government had revoked the bounties placed on Haqqani, Abdul Aziz Haqqani, and Yahya Haqqani.
“These three individuals are two brothers and one paternal cousin,” Qani told the Associated Press.
The Haqqani network grew into one of the deadliest arms of the Taliban after the US-led 2001 invasion of Afghanistan.
The group employed roadside bombs, suicide bombings and other attacks, including on the Indian and US embassies, the Afghan presidency, and other major targets. They also have been linked to extortion, kidnapping and other criminal activity.
A Foreign Ministry official, Zakir Jalaly, said the Taliban’s release of US prisoner George Glezmann on Friday and the removal of bounties showed both sides were “moving beyond the effects of the wartime phase and taking constructive steps to pave the way for progress” in bilateral relations.
“The recent developments in Afghanistan-US relations are a good example of the pragmatic and realistic engagement between the two governments,” said Jalaly.
Another official, Shafi Azam, hailed the development as the beginning of normalization in 2025, citing the Taliban’s announcement it was in control of Afghanistan’s embassy in Norway.
Since the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan in August 2021, China has been the most prominent country to accept one of their diplomats. Other countries have accepted de facto Taliban representatives, like Qatar, which has been a key mediator between the US and the Taliban. US envoys have also met the Taliban.
The Taliban’s rule, especially bans affecting women and girls, has triggered widespread condemnation and deepened their international isolation.
Haqqani has previously spoken out against the Taliban’s decision-making process, authoritarianism, and alienation of the Afghan population.
His rehabilitation on the international stage is in contrast to the status of the reclusive Taliban leader Hibatullah Akhundzada, who could face arrest by the International Criminal Court for his persecution of women.
The US lifts bounties on senior Taliban officials, including Sirajuddin Haqqani
https://arab.news/ynv84
The US lifts bounties on senior Taliban officials, including Sirajuddin Haqqani
- Interior Ministry spokesman Abdul Mateen Qani said the US government had revoked the bounties placed on Haqqani, Abdul Aziz Haqqani, and Yahya Haqqani
UN’s top court opens Myanmar Rohingya genocide case
- The Gambia filed a case against Myanmar at the UN’s top court in 2019
- Verdict expected to impact Israel’s genocide case over war on Gaza
DHAKA: The International Court of Justice on Monday opened a landmark case accusing Myanmar of genocide against its mostly Muslim Rohingya minority.
The Gambia filed a case against Myanmar at the UN’s top court in 2019, two years after a military offensive forced hundreds of thousands of Rohingya from their homes into neighboring Bangladesh.
The hearings will last three weeks and conclude on Jan. 29.
“The ICJ must secure justice for the persecuted Rohingya. This process should not take much longer, as we all know that justice delayed is justice denied,” said Asma Begum, who has been living in the Kutupalong refugee camp in Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazar district since 2017.
A mostly Muslim ethnic minority, the Rohingya have lived for centuries in Myanmar’s western Rakhine state but were stripped of their citizenship in the 1980s and have faced systemic persecution ever since.
In 2017 alone, some 750,000 of them fled military atrocities and crossed to Bangladesh, in what the UN has called a textbook case of ethnic cleansing by Myanmar.
Today, about 1.3 million Rohingya shelter in 33 camps in Cox’s Bazar, turning the coastal district into the world’s largest refugee settlement.
“We experienced horrific acts such as arson, killings and rape in 2017, and fled to Bangladesh,” Begum told Arab News.
“I believe the ICJ verdict will pave the way for our repatriation to our homeland. The world should not forget us.”
A UN fact-finding mission has concluded that the Myanmar 2017 offensive included “genocidal acts” — an accusation rejected by Myanmar, which said it was a “clearance operation” against militants.
Now, there is hope for justice and a new future for those who have been displaced for years.
“We also have the right to live with dignity. I want to return to my homeland and live the rest of my life in my ancestral land. My children will reconnect with their roots and be able to build their own future,” said Syed Ahmed, who fled Myanmar in 2017 and has since been raising his four children in the Kutupalong camp.
“Despite the delay, I am optimistic that the perpetrators will be held accountable through the ICJ verdict. It will set a strong precedent for the world.”
The Myanmar trial is the first genocide case in more than a decade to be taken up by the ICJ. The outcome will also impact the genocide case that Israel is facing over its war on Gaza.
“The momentum of this case at the ICJ will send a strong message to all those (places) around the world where crimes against humanity have been committed,” Nur Khan, a Bangladeshi lawyer and human rights activist, told Arab News.
“The ICJ will play a significant role in ensuring justice regarding accusations of genocide in other parts of the world, such as the genocide and crimes against humanity committed by Israel against the people of Gaza.”
