Ann Jones has a powerful piece at the Nation, about the mob killing of Farkhunda.
I went to Kabul, Afghanistan, in March to see old friends. By chance, I arrived the day after a woman had been beaten to death and burned by a mob of young men. The world would soon come to know her name: Farkhunda. The name means "auspicious" or "jubilant." She was killed in the very heart of the Afghan capital, at a popular shrine, the burial place of an unnamed ghazi, a warrior martyred for Islam. Years ago, I worked only a few doors away.
Why Afghan Women Carried a Funeral Casket for the First Time in Memory, The Nation
She describes the fundamental struggle in Afghanistan as being between the ultraconservative mullahs and warlords, and a progressive Islamic vision.
Now, with the death of Farkhunda, Kabul's civil society took to the streets to reveal what the real contest has been all along: a struggle between ultraconservative Islamist mullahs and warlords, clinging not just to faith but to power, and progressive Islamic men and women intent on moving Afghanistan into the modern world. Not the secular world of the West, but a new Afghan world that would reclaim the old prewar values of a peaceful, humane, more equitable and tolerant Islam.
Mirwais Harooni and Jessica Donati write about the reaction of the Ulema Council to the civil rights protests in Kabul.
Powerful religious leaders in Afghanistan are growing uneasy about the challenge to their authority posed by rare civil rights protests in Kabul and widespread anger over the lynching of a young woman wrongly accused of burning a Koran.
The highest religious authority, the Ulema Council, exerts considerable influence in a country that remains deeply conservative despite significant changes since the hardline Islamist Taliban fell in 2001.
But a series of demonstrations in the capital Kabul promoting women's rights has prompted the clerics to threaten to withdraw support for President Ashraf Ghani in a challenge to his new government.
Afghan clerics uneasy as civil rights movement gains momentum, Reuters
The Ulema Council is a government-funded body of religious leaders, in a complex power dynamic with the government.
The council almost always publically backs the government, and in return gets frequent access to the president as well as influence on his decisions. Yet, when at home in the provinces, members often preach a different message and, at times, attack the administration and its Western backers, actually helping fuel anti-government feelings. AAN’s Borhan Osman has been looking at the contradictions in this influential and under-reported body.
The Ulama Council: paid to win public minds – but do they?, AFghanistan Analysts Network
Borhan Osman, at Afghanistan Analysts Network, had looked at the divide between conservative religious leaders, and civil society activists for human and women's rights.
The two main and conflicting narratives that have emerged pit conservative religious leaders and groups against activists advocating for ‘rights and freedoms’, with both sides blaming each other for having indirectly driven people to murder.
The Killing of Farkhunda (2): Mullahs, feminists and a gap in the debate, Afghanistan Analysts Network
Gunmen attacked a Ulemma Council meeting in Lashkar Gah.
Armed insurgents assaulted a gathering of Afghan religious figures in southern Helmand province on Wednesday, killing seven.
Two gunmen outfitted with assault rifles and hand grenades targeted a group of clerics that had assembled for the weekly meeting of the local Ulemma Council — Afghanistan's highest religious authority — in the provincial capital of Lashkar Gah, Helmand Deputy Police Chief Pacha Gul Bakhtyar told VICE News.
The Taliban — which has been waging a violent insurgency on the Washington-backed Afghan government since US forces removed it from power in 2001 — claimed responsibility for the attack.
Taliban Gunmen Kill Seven in Assault on Afghan Religious Council, VICE News
Gunmen attacked a gathering at a guesthouse in Kabul. One American is reported killed.
A spokeswoman for the U.S. Embassy confirmed that one American was killed in the attack but gave no other details.
Qadam Shah Shaheem, commander of the Afghan National Army's 111th Corps, said police, army and special forces had rescued at least 16 people, but police cited witnesses as saying as many as 100 people were still inside.
Gunmen storm Afghan guest house, at least one American dead, Reuters
Four men have been sentenced to death in the mob killing of Farkhunda.
An Afghan judge on May 6 sentenced four men to death for participating in the mob killing of a woman who was falsely accused of burning pages from the Koran in Kabul.
Afghan Court Sentences Four To Death For Mob Killing Of Farkhunda, Radio Free Europe
The trial, by a internationally created and backed judicial system, was conducted with a summary swiftness.
The trial, which began Saturday, only involved two full days of court proceedings — an unusual swiftness in the slow-moving Afghan judicial system. It was broadcast live on national television, reflecting huge public interest in the case.
Afghan Court Sentences Four To Death For Mob Killing Of Farkhunda, Radio Free Europe
“It was rushed,” said Abdulhakim Qayoumi, a defence lawyer who observed the proceedings. “That is my main concern.”
The family of Farkhunda was also dissatisfied with the process. “The main criminals have not been arrested,” said Mohammad Nader Malikzadah, her father, who spoke to the court before the verdict.
Malikzadah said the police had, for instance, arrested and subsequently released a man who drove over Farkhunda’s dead body with his car. “We don’t accept today’s trial, it was unjust,” he added.
Farkhunda murder: Afghan judge sentences four to death over mob killing, Guardian
Very large numbers of people have fled recent fighting near Kunduz.
A Taliban assault that threatened to overrun a northern Afghan city involved a number of foreign fighters, officials said Saturday, a battle that saw at least 100,000 people flee their homes.
Kunduz’s provincial governor and its police chief suggested the foreign fighters could be part of a small contingent of militants who pledged their loyalty to an Islamic State group affiliate in Afghanistan, but offered no other evidence to support their claim.
The battle in Kunduz began April 24. Thousands of army reinforcements have been deployed to the city. Officials had feared in the days following the attack that Kunduz could fall to the Taliban.
100,000 flee northern Afghan city of Kunduz in Taliban assault, Associated Press
Provincial council members are in a dispute with parliament.
Since they were elected for the first time in 2005, Afghanistan’s Provincial Councils (PCs) have been suffering from ill-defined and, its members think, too little authority. Those elected to the councils ten years ago found out, once in their positions, that they had few facilities and no budget and that governors were often reluctant to work with them. The key issue is ‘oversight’ – which could be of any or all – or none – of the following: government budgets spent in the province, government services, the implementation of development projects and detention centres.
A Half-Solution: Provincial Councils get oversight authority back – for the time being, Afghanistan Analysts Network
Mohammad Dawod and Suhrob Ahmad, at Afghanocentrism, describe a dynamic of official and unofficial power, centralized and local.
There have been two forms of organizational power structure in Afghanistan; the formal and informal power structures, which have historically subordinated and complimented each other. The formal organizational power structure was based on territorial layers of state administration; theMarkaz (center), Valayat (the provinces) andVolaswali (the sub- province). The informal organizational power structure and its relation with the people has never appeared on any administration chart but has been the foundation for a strong and effective mechanism that handled the relationship between the society and state.
From time immemorial, prominent elders from various ethnic groups would congregate in informal assemblies to discuss their social, religious, political and financial issues. Subsequently these informal gatherings developed into local and national assemblies recognized by the state at its creation. These organizational power structure were called Majles Kalan Hia Deh (community committees) here-on to be referred to as Majles.
Is the peace in Afghan society a dream?, Afghanocentrism
Relations between Afghanistan and Pakistan are described as being in a thaw.
Putting old differences aside, Afghanistan and Pakistan are fighting the same enemy. That seemed to be the message as the leaders of the two countries met in Kabul, pledging to work together to fight terrorism.
“I assure you, Mr President, that the enemies of Afghanistan cannot be friends of Pakistan,” Pakistan’s prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, said in a press conference on Tuesday during his first visit to Kabul since the inauguration of Ashraf Ghani as Afghan president.
Sharif came to the Afghan capital after Ghani’s government worked for months to reboot relations with Pakistan. The visit also followed a recent meeting in Qatar between people connected to the Afghan government and the Taliban political leadership, which raised hopes of restarting peace talks.
Afghanistan and Pakistan thaw relations with pledge to fight terrorism together, Guardian
NATO has announced it will retain a military presence in Afghanistan after 2016.
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization on Wednesday formally announced plans to retain a small troop presence in Afghanistan after 2016 to help strengthen Afghan security forces as they struggle against a resilient Taliban insurgency.
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said that the future mission—billed as “Enduring Partnership”—will be led by civilians. “It will have a light footprint, but it will have a military component,” Mr. Stoltenberg said.
NATO Plans Civilian-Led Mission in Afghanistan After 2016, Wall Street Journal