Afghanistan

Coding decisions on the Taliban, external forces, the fall of Kabul, and more

Published on: 2 March 2023 | Last updated: 4 November 2024

The main conflict in Afghanistan began in 2001, following the US-led NATO invasion in the wake of the 11 September attacks and the subsequent overthrow of the Taliban government. In 2003, the Taliban announced it had officially regrouped...

The Taliban’s numbers are often bolstered by foreign fighters mainly from Pakistan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan, though the majority of them still identify as Pashtun...

In addition to the Taliban and its allies, the Islamic State (IS) is also active in Afghanistan. In 2015, IS announced the formation of an Afghanistan/South Asia affiliate...

Since 2018, the Taliban has significantly expanded its control over the country, taking over rural areas and capturing provincial capitals...

In late August, an anti-Taliban resistance began to form in the Panjshir valley in northeastern Afghanistan...

On 7 September 2021, the Taliban formally announced a caretaker government led by one of its founding members, Mullah Muhammad Hassan...

Afghanistan presents unique methodological challenges for recording political violence. These primarily concern the extent of and access to media coverage, which has long suffered from reporting biases and limited access to Afghanistan’s most remote regions...

What does ACLED cover in Afghanistan?

ACLED collects data on political violence and demonstrations in Afghanistan...

Which armed actors are recorded?

Marked changes took place in August 2021, when the Taliban effectively seized control of the country...

Government, government-aligned, and Taliban actors before the fall of Kabul (pre-15 August 2021)

Government Forces:: State forces in Afghanistan were composed of a number of state-sponsored security organizations...

• Police Forces of Afghanistan (2014-2021) National Directorate of Security: the primary intelligence agency in Afghanistan...
• Police Forces of Afghanistan (2014-2021) Sangorians: special forces designated to infiltrate Taliban cells...
• Police Forces of Afghanistan (2014-2021) Special Forces: police commandos/SWAT.

For military forces, this includes:

• Military Forces of Afghanistan (2014-2021) Special Forces: often described as “commandos.”

When government operations were provided with air support, Military Forces of Afghanistan (2014-2021) was coded to account for the air force...

Government, government-aligned, and Taliban actors after the fall of Kabul (post-15 August 2021)

Since the fall of Kabul on 15 August 2021, the central Afghan government and its security forces have ceased to operate and control the country in a meaningful way. As the Taliban have been in de facto control of the country since 16 August 2021...

• Taliban forces are no longer coded as Taliban... Instead, they are coded as Government of Afghanistan (2021-), Military Forces of Afghanistan (2021-)...

Other significant actors, active both before and after 15 August 2021

The Khorasan branch of IS — coded as Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP) — was often the target of both Afghan security and NATO operations...

How are events sourced?

Currently, each week ACLED researchers review approximately 110 sources in English, Dari/Farsi, Pashto, and Arabic in order to provide the most comprehensive database on political violence...

ACLED relies on information from traditional media at the national, regional, and international levels. Approximately one-third of information used in ACLED’s coding of disorder in Afghanistan comes uniquely from traditional media sources...

Sourcing prior to the Doha Agreement and the implementation of RiV

A key sourcing challenge in Afghanistan has been that, in addition to being the site of an ongoing and deadly conflict...

Sourcing after the Doha Agreement before the fall of Kabul

As a result of the peace process beginning in early 2020 between the Taliban and the US, a shift in the MOD and VOJ’s reporting of violence was noticed...

Sourcing following the fall of Kabul

With the fall of Kabul on 15 August 2021, and the Taliban takeover of much of the country, the conflict between the Taliban and Afghan state forces aided by international forces largely concluded...

Where does violence take place, and how are locations recorded in Afghanistan?

While political violence in Afghanistan has occurred nationwide, the majority of events occur in the crescent surrounding the central mountainous area...

How does ACLED record fatalities in Afghanistan?

Fatality counting in the Afghan context faces several obstacles which make efforts to provide reliable estimates difficult...