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Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. It is bordered by Pakistan to the east and south, Iran to the west, Turkmenistan to the northwest, Uzbekistan to the north, Tajikistan to the northeast, and China to the northeast and east. Occupying 652,864 square kilometers (252,072 sq mi) of land, the country is predominantly mountainous with plains in the north and the southwest, which are separated by the Hindu Kush mountain range. Kabul is the country's capital and largest city. According to the World Population review, as of 2023, Afghanistan's population is 43 million. The National Statistics Information Authority of Afghanistan estimated the population to be 32.9 million as of 2020.
The Taliban, which also refers to itself by its state name, the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is an Afghan political and militant movement with an ideology comprising elements of Pashtun nationalism and the Deobandi movement of Islamic fundamentalism. It ruled approximately 75% of Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001, before it was overthrown by an American invasion after the September 11th attacks carried out by the Taliban's ally al-Qaeda. The Taliban recaptured Kabul in August 2021 following the departure of coalition forces, after 20 years of Taliban insurgency, and now controls the entire country. The Taliban government is not recognized by any country and has been internationally condemned for restricting human rights, including women's rights to work and have an education.
Gulbuddin Hekmatyar is an Afghan politician, and former mujahideen leader and drug trafficker. He is the founder and current leader of the Hezb-e-Islami Gulbuddin political party, so called after Mohammad Yunus Khalis split from Hezbi Islami in 1979 to found Hezb-i Islami Khalis. He twice served as prime minister during the 1990s.
Carnegie Hall is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. It is at 881 Seventh Avenue, occupying the east side of Seventh Avenue between 56th and 57th Streets. Designed by architect William Burnet Tuthill and built by industrialist and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie, it is one of the most prestigious venues in the world for both classical music and popular music. Carnegie Hall has its own artistic programming, development, and marketing departments and presents about 250 performances each season. It is also rented out to performing groups.
Mohammad Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai is an Afghan former politician, academic, and economist who served as the president of Afghanistan from September 2014 until August 2021, when his government was overthrown by the Taliban.
Malek Jandali is a Syrian-American composer and pianist, whose music integrates Middle-Eastern modes and Arabic Maqams into Western structures of classical music. He is the founder of the nonprofit organization Pianos for Peace, which aims to build peace through music and education. Jandali immigrated to the United States and studied music in North Carolina. Since then, he has performed with orchestras across the world and composed a number of modern classical works. His music was described as "a major new addition to the 21st century symphonic literature" by Fanfare magazine. with "heart-rending melodies, lush orchestration, clever transitions and creative textures", according to American Record Guide. Jandali's music ranges from chamber works to large symphonic compositions integrating Middle-Eastern and Western influences. He is the biological paternal cousin of Steve Jobs and Mona Simpson.
The Pakistani Taliban, formally called the Tehreek-e-Taliban-e-Pakistan, is an umbrella organization of various Islamist armed militant groups operating along the Afghan–Pakistani border. Formed in 2007 by Baitullah Mehsud, its current leader is Noor Wali Mehsud, who has publicly pledged allegiance to the Afghan Taliban. The Pakistani Taliban share a common ideology with the Afghan Taliban and have assisted them in the 2001–2021 war, but the two groups have separate operation and command structures.
The War in Afghanistan was an armed conflict that took place from 2001 to 2021. Launched as a direct response to the September 11 attacks, the war began when an international military coalition led by the United States invaded Afghanistan, declaring Operation Enduring Freedom as part of the earlier-declared war on terror, toppling the Taliban-ruled Islamic Emirate, and establishing the Islamic Republic three years later. The Taliban and its allies were expelled from major population centers by US-led forces supporting the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance; Osama bin Laden, meanwhile, relocated to neighboring Pakistan. The conflict officially ended with the 2021 Taliban offensive, which overthrew the Islamic Republic, and re-established the Islamic Emirate. It was the longest war in the military history of the United States, surpassing the length of the Vietnam War (1955–1975) by approximately six months.
The Leadership Council of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, also translated as the Supreme Council, is an advisory council to the Supreme Leader of Afghanistan. The supreme leader convenes and chairs the council at his sole discretion. He has ultimate authority and may override or circumvent it at any time. It played a key role in directing the Taliban insurgency from Quetta, Pakistan, which led to it being informally referred to as the Quetta Shura at the time.
Malala Yousafzai is a Pakistani female education activist and the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize laureate at the age of 17. She is the youngest Nobel Prize laureate in history, the second Pakistani and the only Pashtun to receive a Nobel Prize. Yousafzai is a human rights advocate for the education of women and children in her native homeland, Swat, where the Pakistani Taliban had at times banned girls from attending school. Her advocacy has grown into an international movement, and according to former Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, she has become Pakistan's "most prominent citizen."
The National Youth Orchestra of the United States of America (NYO-USA) is the national youth orchestra of the United States. Organized by Carnegie Hall's Weill Music Institute, it was established in 2012, and its first concert tour took place in the summer of 2013. Each summer, following an application and audition process, about 110 musicians ages 16 to 19 attend a two-week residency at Purchase College, New York, followed by a national or international tour.
Ahmad Naser Sarmast is an Afghan-Australian ethnomusicologist. He is the founder and director of the Afghanistan National Institute of Music.
Mullah Mohammad Yaqoob Mujahid is an Afghan militant commander and cleric who is the second deputy leader of Afghanistan and the acting defense minister in the internationally unrecognized Taliban regime since 2021. He has been a deputy leader of the Taliban since 2016, and was additionally appointed to his ministerial role after the Taliban's victory over Western-backed forces in the 2001–2021 war. He has been the Taliban's military chief since 2020.
Senior leaders of the Afghan Taliban have been stationed in Doha, Qatar, since the early 2010s. The original purpose for being there was to open an office that would facilitate political reconciliation between the Taliban, the government of Afghanistan, the United States and other countries. After the Taliban office building opened in 2013, peace negotiations were suspended following objections by the Afghan government that the office was being presented as the embassy of a government in exile. Taliban leaders remained in Doha with accommodation from the Qatari government, on the condition that the office cannot be used for public dealings.
The Afghanistan National Institute of Music (ANIM) is an exiled school of music that was formerly operated in Kabul, Afghanistan and is currently based in Lisbon, Portugal. It was founded in 2010 by the Afghan-Australian ethnomusicologist Dr. Ahmad Naser Sarmast, and offers a curriculum combining the tuition of both Afghan and Western music. ANIM is a co-educational institute.
Peace processes have taken place during several phases of the Afghanistan conflict, which has lasted since the 1978 Saur Revolution.
The Zohra Orchestra, also known as the Afghan Women's Orchestra and Ensemble Zohra, is Afghanistan's first all-female orchestra, named after the music goddess in Persian writings. Founded in 2015, it has been in exile since the 2021 seizure of Kabul by the Taliban.
The Afghanistan fighting season refers to the cyclical restarting of fighting every spring during the War in Afghanistan (2001–2021) due to weather and economic factors. It generally ran from April to October and saw more combat deaths than the off-season. The Taliban, who were the main insurgent group during the War, would annually call their post-winter fighting restart as their spring offensive.
The United States Armed Forces completed their withdrawal from Afghanistan on 30 August 2021, marking the end of the 2001–2021 war. In February 2020, the Trump administration and the Taliban signed the United States–Taliban deal in Doha, Qatar, which stipulated fighting restrictions for both the US and the Taliban, and in return for the Taliban's counter-terrorism commitments, provided for the withdrawal of all NATO forces from Afghanistan by 1 May 2021. Following the deal, the US dramatically reduced the number of air attacks on the Taliban at the detriment of the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) fighting the Taliban insurgency. The Biden administration's final decision in April 2021 was to begin the withdrawal on 1 May 2021, but the final pull-out of all US troops was delayed until September 2021, triggering the start of the collapse of the ANSF. This collapse led to the Taliban takeover of Kabul on 15 August 2021.
The Agreement for Bringing Peace to Afghanistan, commonly known as the United States–Taliban deal or the Doha Accord, was a peace agreement signed by the United States and the Taliban on 29 February 2020 in Doha, Qatar, to bring an end to the 2001–2021 war in Afghanistan. Negotiated for the US by Zalmay Khalilzad for the Trump administration, the agreement did not involve the then Afghan government. The deal, which also had secret annexes, was one of the critical events that caused the collapse of the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces (ANDSF). Adhering to the conditions of the deal, the US dramatically reduced the number of US air raids, leaving the ANDSF without a key advantage in keeping the Taliban at bay. This resulted in "a sense of abandonment within the ANDSF and the Afghan population" according to a report by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR). ANDSF was ill-prepared to sustain security following a US withdrawal, which allowed for the Taliban insurgency, ultimately leading to the Taliban takeover of Kabul on 15 August 2021.
References
- ↑ Mirna Alsharif; Marc Smith (8 August 2024). "The Taliban tried to silence these young musicians. Now they're playing Carnegie Hall". NBC News. Retrieved 13 August 2024.
- ↑ Doane, Seth (12 February 2013). "Afghan youth orchestra hopes to bring peace through music". CBS Evening News . Retrieved 16 February 2013.
- ↑ Talmazan, Yuliya (18 November 2021). "Afghanistan's only music school completes exit from Kabul fearing Taliban crackdown". NBC News . Retrieved 12 August 2023.
