UN chief, international envoys to discuss Afghanistan crisis in Doha today

Secretary-General of the United Nations (UN) Antonio Guterres speaks during the 5th Conference on the Least Developed Countries (LDC5) in Doha on March 4, 2023. (AFP/File)
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Updated 01 May 2023
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UN chief, international envoys to discuss Afghanistan crisis in Doha today

  • UN chief to meet international envoys at secret location in Doha to find ways to influence Taliban 
  • Taliban, who have imposed restrictions on women in Afghanistan, will be absent from talks, say diplomats

DOHA: UN chief Antonio Guterres will gather international envoys at a secret location in Doha on Monday in an increasingly desperate bid to find ways to influence Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers.

Considered the world’s biggest humanitarian crisis by the United Nations, Guterres’s quandary has been deepened by the Taliban administration’s move to stop girls going to school and most women from working, even for UN agencies.

The Taliban government, which took back power in August 2021, will be absent from the talks with representatives from about 25 countries and international organizations, according to diplomats.

Ahead of the talks, a small group of women staged a protest in Kabul on Saturday to oppose any international recognition of the Taliban government. But the UN and Western powers are adamant this will not be discussed.

“Any kind of recognition of the Taliban is completely off the table,” said US State Department spokesman Vedant Patel.

Apart from confirming that the Taliban leadership is not on the list of participants, the UN has refused to provide any specifics including the location in Qatar’s capital or who will join Guterres.

The Taliban’s deputy minister for refugees Mohammad Arsala Kharoti said on Sunday that “such meetings will not have any results.”

“As long as they don’t establish proper relations with the Emirate (Taliban-ruled Afghanistan) and no representation of the Emirate is present, these meetings won’t be successful to a great extent,” he told AFP at Kabul airport.

In Doha, the UN secretary-general is also to give an update on a review of the world body’s critical relief operation in Afghanistan, ordered in April after authorities had stopped Afghan women from working with UN agencies, diplomats said.

The UN has said it faces an “appalling choice” over whether to maintain its huge operation in the country of 38 million.

Torn apart over the Ukraine war and other global tensions, the UN Security Council powers united on Thursday to condemn the curbs on Afghan women and girls and urge all countries to seek “an urgent reversal” of the policies.

The Afghan foreign ministry rejected the call and said the ban “is an internal social matter of Afghanistan.”

Richard Gowan, UN expert for the International Crisis Group, an independent NGO, said the UN is “in a trap over Afghanistan.”

“Guterres has to untangle a very complicated knot. He needs to find a way to keep aid flowing into Afghanistan, but the Taliban ban on women is a huge blow to the UN’s ability to operate in the country.”

Gowan said the international community wants the UN to maintain its critical presence.

“There are lots of differences among Security Council members over Afghanistan. But everyone, including Russia and China, agrees it is better to have the UN in Kabul than not.”

The United Nations has given few indications of what proposals could be made at the meeting.

UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said on Friday the aim “is to reinvigorate international engagement around common objectives for a durable way forward on Afghanistan.”

The global body also wants “unity or commonality of message” on women’s and human rights, countering terrorism and drug trafficking.

“Recognition is not an issue,” Dujarric insisted. Whether the Taliban government takes up Afghanistan’s UN seat is for the UN General Assembly to decide.

But the UN and other groups have been holding increasingly intense discussions on how to engage with the Taliban authorities and possibly offer incentives for change.

US Afghanistan envoy Thomas West has been traveling across West Asia in recent weeks meeting different governments and groups.

Last year the United States moved $3.5 billion of seized Afghan assets into a Swiss-based fund to pay for relief and imports that are not controlled by the Taliban authorities.

Suggestions have been made that the US administration should consider easing sanctions.

“Much as we might prefer to see regime change in Afghanistan, for the foreseeable future a reasonably stable and sufficiently capable Taliban government is needed to help facilitate humanitarian programs, neutralize ISKP, and avert state collapse and civil war,” Washington think tank Middle East Institute said in a report last week.


Cyprus police arrest man on spying, terror charges

Updated 4 sec ago
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Cyprus police arrest man on spying, terror charges

Police declined to provide extensive details, citing “national security,“
Local media said the suspect was seen acting suspiciously near a British air force base at Akrotiri

NICOSIA: Cyprus police said they arrested an individual on espionage and terror charges on Saturday, with local media reporting the suspect had ties to Iran.

Police declined to provide extensive details, citing “national security,” but local media said the suspect was seen acting suspiciously near a British air force base at Akrotiri, outside the southern coastal city of Limassol.

Cypriot news outlet Philenews reported the man had links to “Iranian operatives” and had arrived on the Mediterranean island last month posing as a British tourist.

It said the arrest in Limassol on Saturday was based on information from a foreign intelligence service.

“Following a coordinated operation today, an individual suspected of involvement in terrorism-related offenses was arrested,” said a brief police announcement.

The suspect appeared before a district court and was issued an eight-day remand order for “offenses related, among others, to terrorism and espionage,” the police statement added.

Philenews said high-resolution cameras, telephoto lenses, notes, computers and three mobile phones were discovered at the suspect’s apartment.

It described the suspect as being of Azeri descent, referring to an ethnic group present in Azerbaijan and northwest Iran.

The outlet also reported that two people believed to be linked to the case were arrested in Britain.

The British foreign and defense ministries did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Thanks to its location in the eastern Mediterranean, Cyprus has become a key transit hub for third-country nationals fleeing the region since the recent outbreak of hostilities between Israel and Iran.

It has also become a staging post for Israelis seeking to return home by air or sea after being stranded abroad by the start of the fighting.

IAEA says centrifuge workshop at Iran’s Isfahan nuclear site hit

Updated 21 June 2025
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IAEA says centrifuge workshop at Iran’s Isfahan nuclear site hit

  • “There was no nuclear material at this site and therefore the attack on it will have no radiological consequences,” Grossi said

VIENNA: The UN nuclear agency confirmed on Saturday that a centrifuge manufacturing workshop at Iran’s Isfahan nuclear site had been hit, in the latest strike amid Israel’s bombing campaign.


“A centrifuge manufacturing workshop has been hit in Esfahan, the third such facility that has been targeted in Israel’s attacks on Iran’s nuclear-related sites over the past week,” the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said in a statement quoting its chief Rafael Grossi.

“We know this facility well. There was no nuclear material at this site and therefore the attack on it will have no radiological consequences,” Grossi was quoted as saying.


Turkiye says Israel leading Middle East to ‘total disaster’

Updated 21 June 2025
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Turkiye says Israel leading Middle East to ‘total disaster’

  • “Israel is now leading the region to the brink of total disaster,” Fidan said
  • He called for an end to the “unlimited aggression” against Iran

ISATANBUL: Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan on Saturday accused Israel of leading the Middle East toward “total disaster” by attacking Iran on June 13.

“Israel is now leading the region to the brink of total disaster by attacking Iran, our neighbor,” he told a summit of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) in Istanbul.

“There is no Palestinian, Lebanese, Syrian, Yemeni or Iranian problem but there is clearly an Israeli problem,” Fidan said.

He called for an end to the “unlimited aggression” against Iran.

“We must prevent the situation from deteriorating into a spiral of violence that would further jeopardize regional and global security,” he added.

Speaking after Fidan, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan accused Western leaders of providing “unconditional support” to Israel.

He said Turkiye would not allow borders in the Middle East to be redrawn “in blood.”

“It is vital for us to show more solidarity to end Israel’s banditry — not only in Palestine but also in Syria, in Lebanon and in Iran,” he told the OIC’s 57 member countries.

The OIC, founded in 1969, says its mission is to “safeguard and protect the interests of the Muslim world in the spirit of promoting international peace and harmony.”


Iran says more than 400 killed since start of war with Israel

Updated 21 June 2025
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Iran says more than 400 killed since start of war with Israel

  • Attacks have claimed the lives of over 400 defenseless Iranians and left 3,056 others wounded

TEHRAN: Israeli strikes on Iran have killed more than 400 people since they began last week, Iran’s health ministry said in an updated toll on Saturday, as fighting raged between the two foes.

“As of this morning, Israeli attacks have claimed the lives of over 400 defenseless Iranians and left 3,056 others wounded by missiles and drones,” health ministry spokesman Hossein Kermanpour said in a post on X.


Erdogan says UNRWA to open office in Turkiye, calls for more support for agency

Updated 21 June 2025
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Erdogan says UNRWA to open office in Turkiye, calls for more support for agency

  • Turkiye has called Israel’s assault on Gaza genocide and its move to ban UNRWA a violation of international law
  • “We expect our organization and each member state to provide financial and moral support to UNRWA to thwart Israel’s games,” Erdogan said

ANKARA: The United Nations’ Palestinian refugee agency UNRWA will open an office in Ankara, President Tayyip Erdogan said on Saturday, urging Muslim countries to give the agency more support after Israel banned it.

Israel last year banned UNRWA, saying it had employed members of Palestinian militant group Hamas who took part in the October 2023 attacks on Israel that triggered the Gaza war.

Turkiye has called Israel’s assault on Gaza genocide and its move to ban UNRWA a violation of international law, particularly amid worsening humanitarian conditions in Gaza, which has been reduced to rubble with millions displaced.

Addressing foreign ministers of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation in Istanbul, Erdogan said opening an Ankara UNRWA office would deepen Turkiye’s support for the agency.

“We must not allow UNRWA, which plays an irreplaceable role in terms of taking care of Palestinian refugees, to be paralyzed by Israel. We expect our organization and each member state to provide financial and moral support to UNRWA to thwart Israel’s games,” Erdogan said.

A Turkish diplomatic source said Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan and UNRWA chief Philippe Lazzarini were expected to sign an accord on the sidelines of the OIC meeting in Istanbul on establishing the office.

Turkiye has given UNRWA $10 million a year between 2023 and 2025. In 2024, it also transferred $2 million and sent another $3 million from its AFAD disaster management authority.

Israel has handed responsibility for distributing much of the aid it lets into Gaza to a new US-backed group, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which operates three sites in areas guarded by Israeli troops. The UN has rejected the GHF operation saying its distribution work is inadequate, dangerous and violates humanitarian impartiality principles.

Previously, aid to Gaza’s 2.3 million residents had been distributed mainly by UN agencies such as UNRWA with thousands of staff at hundreds of sites across the enclave.