| Afghanistan at the 2011 Asian Winter Games | |
|---|---|
 | |
| IOC code | AFG |
| NOC | Afghanistan National Olympic Committee |
| in Astana and Almaty | |
| Competitors | 1 in 1 sport |
| Medals |
|
| Asian Winter Games appearances | |
Afghanistan participated in the 2011 Asian Winter Games in Almaty and Astana, Kazakhstan from January 30, 2011, to February 6, 2011. [1]
Afghanistan's only athlete competed in one race finishing in seventh (and last) place.
| Athlete | Event | Final | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Time | Deficit | Rank | ||
| Omar Rona | 15 km classical | 1:27:32.9 | +38:01.9 | 7 |
The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan is a landlocked country at the crossroads of Central and South Asia. It is bordered by Pakistan to the east and south, Iran to the west, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan to the north, and Tajikistan and China to the northeast. Occupying 652,864 square kilometers (252,072 sq mi), the country is predominately mountainous with plains in the north and southwest. It is inhabited by 31.4 million people as of 2020, composed mostly of ethnic Pashtuns, Tajiks, Hazaras, and Uzbeks. Kabul serves as its capital and largest city.
The history of Afghanistan as a state began in 1880 with its establishment following the end of the Second Anglo-Afghan War. Its history is tied to that of other countries in its region, mostly Pakistan, India, Iran, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. The written recorded history of the land presently constituting Afghanistan can be traced back to around 500 BCE when the area was under the Achaemenid Empire, although evidence indicates that an advanced degree of urbanized culture has existed in the land since between 3000 and 2000 BCE. Bactria dates back to 2500 BCE. The Indus Valley Civilisation stretched up to large parts of Afghanistan in the north. Alexander the Great and his Macedonian army arrived at what is now Afghanistan in 330 BCE after the fall of the Achaemenid Empire during the Battle of Gaugamela. Since then, many empires have established capitals in what is now Afghanistan, including the Greco-Bactrians, Kushans, Indo-Sassanids, Kabul Shahi, Saffarids, Samanids, Ghaznavids, Ghurids, Kartids, Timurids, Hotakis and Durranis.
Kabul is the capital and largest city of Afghanistan, located in the eastern section of the country. It is also a municipality, forming part of the greater Kabul Province, and divided into 22 districts. According to estimates in 2021, the population of Kabul is 4.6 million and it serves as Afghanistan's political, cultural and economical center. Rapid urbanization has made Kabul the world's 75th largest city.
Kandahar is a city in Afghanistan, located in the south of the country on the Arghandab River, at an elevation of 1,010 m (3,310 ft). It is Afghanistan's second largest city after Kabul, with a population of about 614,118. It is the capital of Kandahar Province as well as the de facto capital of the Taliban, formally known as the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. It also happens to be the centre of the larger cultural region called Loy Kandahar. In 1709, Mirwais Hotak made the region an independent kingdom and turned Kandahar into the capital of the Hotak dynasty. In 1747, Ahmad Shah Durrani, founder of the Durrani dynasty, made Kandahar the capital of the Afghan Empire.
Mazār-i-Sharīf, also called Mazār-e Sharīf, or just Mazar, is the fourth-largest city of Afghanistan, with a population estimate of 500,207 people. It is the capital of Balkh province and is linked by highways with Kunduz in the east, Kabul in the southeast, Herat in the southwest and Termez, Uzbekistan in the north. It is about 55 km (34 mi) from the Uzbek border. The city is also a tourist attraction because of its famous shrines as well as the Islamic and Hellenistic archeological sites. The ancient city of Balkh is also nearby.
The Taliban is a Deobandi Islamist religious-political movement and military organization in Afghanistan. Currently one of two entities claiming to be the legitimate government of Afghanistan, alongside the internationally recognized Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, the Taliban maintain de facto control over the country. The Taliban's ideology has been described as combining an "innovative" form of Sharia Islamic law based on Deobandi fundamentalism and militant Islamism, combined with Pashtun social and cultural norms known as Pashtunwali, as most Taliban are Pashtun tribesmen. The group is internally funded by its activities in the illegal drug trade by producing and trafficking narcotics such as heroin, extortion, and kidnap and ransom. They also seized control of mining operations in the mid 2010s which were illegal under the previous government.
The Democratic Republic of Afghanistan (DRA), renamed the Republic of Afghanistan in 1986, existed from 1978 to 1992, during which time the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA) ruled Afghanistan.
The population of Afghanistan is around 39 million as of 2021. The nation is composed of a multi-ethnic and multilingual society, reflecting its location astride historic trade and invasion routes between Central Asia, Southern Asia, and Western Asia. Ethnic groups in the country include Pashtun, Tajik, Hazara, Uzbeks, Nuristanis, Aimaq, Turkmen, Baloch and a number of others which are less known.
The Soviet–Afghan War was a conflict wherein insurgent groups, as well as smaller Shi'ite and Maoist groups, fought a nine-year guerrilla war against the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan and the Soviet Army throughout the 1980s, mostly in the Afghan countryside. The Mujahideen were variously backed primarily by the United States, Pakistan, Iran, Saudi Arabia, China, and the United Kingdom; the conflict was a Cold War-era proxy war. Between 562,000 and 2,000,000 Afghans were killed and millions more fled the country as refugees, mostly to Pakistan and Iran. Between 6.5%–11.5% of Afghanistan's population is estimated to have perished in the conflict. The war caused grave destruction in Afghanistan, and it has also been cited by scholars as a contributing factor to the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War, in hindsight leaving a mixed legacy to people in both territories.
Hamid Karzai is an Afghan politician who served as President of Afghanistan from 22 December 2001 to 29 September 2014. He is also the leader of the Popalzai Durrani tribe of Kandahar.
The International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) was a multinational military mission in Afghanistan from 2001 to 2014. It was established by United Nations Security Council Resolution 1386 pursuant to the Bonn Agreement, which outlined the establishment of a permanent Afghan government following the U.S. invasion in October 2001. ISAF's primary goal was to train the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) and assist Afghanistan in rebuilding key government institutions; however, it gradually took part in the broader war in Afghanistan against the Taliban insurgency.
The Durand Line forms the Afghanistan–Pakistan border, a 2,670-kilometre (1,660 mi) international land border between the countries of Afghanistan and Pakistan in South Asia. The western end runs to the border with Iran and the eastern end to the border with China.
The Afghan National Army was the land warfare branch of the Afghan Armed Forces. The Army's roots could be traced back to the early 18th century when the Hotak dynasty was established in Kandahar followed by Ahmad Shah Durrani's rise to power. It was reorganized in 1880 during Emir Abdur Rahman Khan's reign. Afghanistan remained neutral during the First and Second World Wars. From the 1960s to the early 1990s, the Afghan Army was equipped by the Soviet Union.
Panjshir is one of the thirty-four provinces of Afghanistan, located in the northeastern part of the country containing the Panjshir Valley. The province is divided into seven districts and contains 512 villages. As of 2021, the population of Panjshir province was about 173,000. Bazarak serves as the provincial capital.
The Taliban insurgency was an insurgency that began after the group's fall from power during the 2001 War in Afghanistan. The Taliban forces fought against the Afghan government, led by President Hamid Karzai, and later by President Ashraf Ghani, and against a US-led coalition of forces that has included all members of NATO; the 2021 Taliban offensive resulted in the collapse of the government of Ashraf Ghani.
Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, alternatively referred to as the Pakistani Taliban, is a Pashtun Islamist armed student group that is an umbrella organization of various student militant groups based along the Afghan–Pakistani border. Most Taliban groups in Pakistan coalesce under the TTP. In December 2007, about 13 groups united under the leadership of Baitullah Mehsud to form the TTP.
The War in Afghanistan was a conflict that took place from 2001 to 2021 in the country of Afghanistan. It started when the United States and its allies invaded Afghanistan and toppled the Taliban-ruled Islamic Emirate. The war ended with the Taliban regaining power after a 19 years and 8 months insurgency against allied NATO and Afghan Armed Forces. It was the longest war in United States history, surpassing the Vietnam War (1955–1975) by roughly five months.
As of July 27, 2018, there were 2,372 United States military deaths and 4 Department of Defense civilian deaths in the War in Afghanistan. 1,856 of these deaths have been the result of hostile action. 320 American servicemembers have also been wounded in action during the war. In addition, there were 1,720 U.S. civilian contractor fatalities, for a total of 4,096 Americans killed during the war.
The Afghanistan conflict is a series of wars fought in Afghanistan from 1978 through to the present day. Afghanistan has been in a continuous state of civil war since the Soviet invasion in 1979. Previously, the Kingdom of Afghanistan was overthrown in the relatively bloodless 1973 Afghan coup d'état, which brought the monarch Mohammed Zahir Shah’s 39-year reign to an end, and ended Afghanistan’s relatively peaceful period in modern history. Starting with the Saur Revolution military coup, an almost continuous series of armed conflicts has dominated and afflicted Afghanistan, including a Soviet invasion, a series of civil wars between mujahideen groups, notably the Taliban, a NATO invasion, a Taliban insurgency, and fighting between the Taliban and the Islamic State – Khorasan Province. The conflict includes:
The Islamic Republic of Afghanistan was an Islamic republic that existed between 2004 and 2021 during the War in Afghanistan. It was established in 2004 after the 2001 United States invasion of Afghanistan captured most of the country from the Taliban-led Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. It lost control of the majority of the country to the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan in August 2021, culminating in the loss of Kabul on 15 August 2021.