DOCSLIB.ORG

Afghanistan: Politics, Elections, and Government Performance

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Afghanistan: Politics, Elections, and Government Performance Afghanistan: Politics, Elections, and Government Performance Kenneth Katzman Specialist in Middle Eastern Affairs March 19, 2013 Congressional Research Service 7-5700 www.crs.gov RS21922 CRS Report for Congress Prepared for Members and Committees of Congress Afghanistan: Politics, Elections, and Government Performance Summary The capacity and transparency of Afghan governance are considered crucial to Afghan stability after U.S.-led NATO forces turn over the security mission to Afghan leadership by the end of 2014. The size and capability of the Afghan governing structure has increased significantly since the Taliban regime fell in late 2001, but it remains weak and rampant with governmental corruption. Even as the government has struggled to widen its writ, President Hamid Karzai has tried to concentrate authority in Kabul through his constitutional powers of appointment at all levels. Karzai has repeatedly denied that he wants to stay in office beyond the 2014 expiration of his second term, but there are concerns he plans to use state election machinery to support the election of a successor. International efforts to curb fraud in two successive elections (for president in 2009 and parliament in 2010) largely failed, but Afghan efforts to improve election oversight for the April 5, 2014 presidential and provincial elections are taking shape. Opposition parties and civil society organizations are working to try to ensure a fair election. Fears about the election process are fanned by the scant progress in reducing widespread nepotism and other forms of corruption. President Karzai has accepted U.S. help to build emerging anti-corruption institutions, but these same bodies have faltered from lack of support at senior Afghan government levels. At a donors’ conference in Tokyo on July 8, 2012, donors pledged to aid Afghanistan’s economy through at least 2017, on the condition that Afghanistan takes concrete, verifiable action to rein in corruption. No matter how the Afghan leadership succession process works out, there is concern among many observers that governance will founder as the United States and its partners wind down their involvement in Afghanistan at the end of 2014. The informal power structure consisting of regional and ethnic leaders—who have always been at least as significant a factor in governance as the formal power structure—is already beginning to assert itself in anticipation of the 2014 international drawdown. Many Afghans are looking to the faction leaders, rather than to the government, to protect them from possible civil conflict with the Taliban after 2014. But, an increase in the influence of faction leaders could produce even more corruption and arbitrary administration of justice than is the case now. President Karzai is seeking to establish himself as a nationalist leader and perhaps to attract Taliban support to rejoin Afghan politics by asserting Afghan sovereignty as the United States draws down troops. Leaders of factions outside Karzai’s ethnic Pashtun base criticize Karzai as too willing to make concessions to insurgent leaders in search of a settlement. Afghan civil society activists, particularly women’s groups, assert that a full reintegration of the Taliban into Afghan politics—a development increasingly likely as talks between relatively moderate Taliban figures and Afghan political leaders proliferate—could further set back human and women’s rights. Broader issues of human rights often vary depending on the security environment in particular regions, although some trends prevail nationwide. Women, media professionals, and civil society groups have made substantial gains since the fall of the Taliban, but traditional attitudes contribute to the judicial and political system’s continued toleration of child marriages, imprisonment of women who flee domestic violence, judgments against converts from Islam to Christianity, and curbs on the sale of alcohol and Western-oriented programming in the Afghan media. See also CRS Report RL30588, Afghanistan: Post-Taliban Governance, Security, and U.S. Policy, by Kenneth Katzman; and CRS Report R41484, Afghanistan: U.S. Rule of Law and Justice Sector Assistance, by Liana Sun Wyler and Kenneth Katzman. Congressional Research Service Afghanistan: Politics, Elections, and Government Performance Contents Overview: Historic Patterns of Afghan Authority and Politics ........................................................ 1 Afghan Ethnicities, Communities, and Their Relationships...................................................... 2 Pashtuns ............................................................................................................................... 2 Tajiks ................................................................................................................................... 2 Hazaras ................................................................................................................................ 3 Uzbeks ................................................................................................................................. 4 Ethnic and Factional Cooperation in the Security Sector .................................................... 4 The Role of Political Parties ...................................................................................................... 5 Post-Taliban Transition and Political Landscape ............................................................................. 6 Establishment of the Formal Afghan Government Structure: Elected but Centralized Leadership .............................................................................................................................. 6 December 2001 Bonn Agreement ....................................................................................... 7 Permanent Constitution Adopted, Sets Up Presidential System ......................................... 7 National Assembly (Parliament) Formation, Powers, and Assertion of Powers ................. 8 The Judiciary and Rule of Law ......................................................................................... 10 Rivalries Within and Outside Governing Institutions .............................................................. 12 Karzai’s Presidential Leadership, His Close Advisers, and Staff ...................................... 12 The Political Opposition: The “Northern Alliance,” Dr. Abdullah, and Others ................ 17 The Informal Power Structure: Other Power Brokers, “Warlords,” and Local Faction Leaders ................................................................................................................................. 19 Traditional Decision-Making Processes Of the Informal Power Structure ....................... 24 Emerging Power Centers: Civil Society and “Independent” Activists .................................... 25 Elections in 2009 and 2010 Harmed Confidence in the Electoral Process and Widened Political Schisms .................................................................................................................. 26 2009 Presidential Election ................................................................................................. 26 September 18, 2010, Parliamentary Elections ................................................................... 29 April 5, 2014 Presidential and Provincial Elections: Credibility Still in Doubt ................ 34 Afghan Governing Capacity and Performance .............................................................................. 37 Expanding Central Government Capacity ............................................................................... 38 The Afghan Civil Service .................................................................................................. 39 The Afghan Budget Process .............................................................................................. 39 Expanding Local (Subnational) Governance ........................................................................... 41 The Independent Directorate for Local Governance (IDLG) ............................................ 42 Provincial Governors and Provincial Councils ................................................................. 42 District-Level Governance ................................................................................................ 43 Municipal and Village Level Authority ............................................................................. 44 Reforming Afghan Governance: Curbing Corruption ............................................................. 44 High Level Corruption, Nepotism, and Cronyism ............................................................ 45 Lower-Level Corruption.................................................................................................... 45 Administration Views and Policy on Corruption .............................................................. 46 Anti-Corruption Initiatives ................................................................................................ 46 Kabul Bank Scandal and Continuing Difficulties ............................................................. 50 Moves to Penalize Lack of Progress on Corruption .......................................................... 52 Promoting Human Rights and Civil Society ........................................................................... 53 Institution-Building: The Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) and Outside Human Rights
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Jihadism: Online Discourses and Representations
    1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 Open-Access-Publikation im Sinne der CC-Lizenz BY-NC-ND 4.0 1 Studying Jihadism 2 3 4 5 6 Volume 2 7 8 9 10 11 Edited by Rüdiger Lohlker 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 The volumes of this series are peer-reviewed. 37 38 Editorial Board: Farhad Khosrokhavar (Paris), Hans Kippenberg 39 (Erfurt), Alex P. Schmid (Vienna), Roberto Tottoli (Naples) 40 41 Open-Access-Publikation im Sinne der CC-Lizenz BY-NC-ND 4.0 1 Rüdiger Lohlker (ed.) 2 3 4 5 6 7 Jihadism: Online Discourses and 8 9 Representations 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 With many figures 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 & 37 V R unipress 38 39 Vienna University Press 40 41 Open-Access-Publikation im Sinne der CC-Lizenz BY-NC-ND 4.0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; 24 detailed bibliographic data are available online: http://dnb.d-nb.de.
    [Show full text]
  • Old Habits, New Consequences Old Habits, New Khalid Homayun Consequences Nadiri Pakistan’S Posture Toward Afghanistan Since 2001
    Old Habits, New Consequences Old Habits, New Khalid Homayun Consequences Nadiri Pakistan’s Posture toward Afghanistan since 2001 Since the terrorist at- tacks of September 11, 2001, Pakistan has pursued a seemingly incongruous course of action in Afghanistan. It has participated in the U.S. and interna- tional intervention in Afghanistan both by allying itself with the military cam- paign against the Afghan Taliban and al-Qaida and by serving as the primary transit route for international military forces and matériel into Afghanistan.1 At the same time, the Pakistani security establishment has permitted much of the Afghan Taliban’s political leadership and many of its military command- ers to visit or reside in Pakistani urban centers. Why has Pakistan adopted this posture of Afghan Taliban accommodation despite its nominal participa- tion in the Afghanistan intervention and its public commitment to peace and stability in Afghanistan?2 This incongruence is all the more puzzling in light of the expansion of insurgent violence directed against Islamabad by the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), a coalition of militant organizations that are independent of the Afghan Taliban but that nonetheless possess social and po- litical links with Afghan cadres of the Taliban movement. With violence against Pakistan growing increasingly indiscriminate and costly, it remains un- clear why Islamabad has opted to accommodate the Afghan Taliban through- out the post-2001 period. Despite a considerable body of academic and journalistic literature on Pakistan’s relationship with Afghanistan since 2001, the subject of Pakistani accommodation of the Afghan Taliban remains largely unaddressed. Much of the existing literature identiªes Pakistan’s security competition with India as the exclusive or predominant driver of Pakistani policy vis-à-vis the Afghan Khalid Homayun Nadiri is a Ph.D.
    [Show full text]
  • El Viaje De La Muerte”1
    Informe de la ONG británica Reprieve que sacó del anonimato muchas historias de presos de Guantánamo y cómo EEUU los compró “El viaje de la muerte”1 Más de 700 prisioneros fueron enviados ilegalmente a Guantánamo con la ayuda de Portugal Reprieve, 28 de enero de 2008 Traducido del inglés para Rebelión por Germán Leyens La organización británica Reprieve muestra de modo concluyente que territorio y espacio aéreo portugueses han sido utilizados para transferir a más de 700 prisioneros para ser torturados y encarcelados ilegalmente en Guantánamo. Mediante la comparación de registros de vuelo obtenidos de las autoridades portuguesas,2información del Departamento de Defensa de EE.UU. mostrando fechas de llegada de prisioneros a Guantánamo, y testimonios no confidenciales de los propios prisioneros, 3 Reprieve puede identificar por primera vez a 728 prisioneros enviados a Guantánamo pasando por la jurisdicción portuguesa. La investigación también muestra que Portugal ha jugado un papel sustancial de apoyo en el programa general de entregas [‘extraordinarias’]. Por lo menos nueve prisioneros transportados pasando por la jurisdicción portuguesa fueron severamente torturados en prisiones secretas en todo el mundo antes de su llegada a Guantánamo.4 Vuelos de entregas de prisioneros a Guantánamo pasando por jurisdicción 1 Definición de Adil Zamil, prisionero transportado en el Vuelo RCH108Y que pasó por jurisdicción portuguesa hacia Guantánamo: “Llamo el viaje a Guantánamo ‘El viaje de la muerte.’ Discretamente estuve deseando que el avión se cayera para terminar con el dolor que sentía.” Fuente: “Kuwaiti Gitmo Detainees Speak Out about Abuse” [Detenidos en Guantánamo hablan del abuso], de Rania El Gamal, Kuwait Times, 1 de diciembre de 2006 2 Registros de vuelo obtenidos por Ana Gomes, miembro del Parlamento Europeo, en 2006 revelan que aviones cruzaron en por lo menos 94 ocasiones el espacio aéreo portugués en camino a, o desde, Guantánamo entre 2002 y 2006.
    [Show full text]
  • The Current Detainee Population of Guantánamo: an Empirical Study
    © Reuters/HO Old – Detainees at XRay Camp in Guantanamo. The Current Detainee Population of Guantánamo: An Empirical Study Benjamin Wittes and Zaahira Wyne with Erin Miller, Julia Pilcer, and Georgina Druce December 16, 2008 The Current Detainee Population of Guantánamo: An Empiricial Study Table of Contents Executive Summary 1 Introduction 3 The Public Record about Guantánamo 4 Demographic Overview 6 Government Allegations 9 Detainee Statements 13 Conclusion 22 Note on Sources and Methods 23 About the Authors 28 Endnotes 29 Appendix I: Detainees at Guantánamo 46 Appendix II: Detainees Not at Guantánamo 66 Appendix III: Sample Habeas Records 89 Sample 1 90 Sample 2 93 Sample 3 96 The Current Detainee Population of Guantánamo: An Empiricial Study EXECUTIVE SUMMARY he following report represents an effort both to document and to describe in as much detail as the public record will permit the current detainee population in American T military custody at the Guantánamo Bay Naval Station in Cuba. Since the military brought the first detainees to Guantánamo in January 2002, the Pentagon has consistently refused to comprehensively identify those it holds. While it has, at various times, released information about individuals who have been detained at Guantánamo, it has always maintained ambiguity about the population of the facility at any given moment, declining even to specify precisely the number of detainees held at the base. We have sought to identify the detainee population using a variety of records, mostly from habeas corpus litigation, and we have sorted the current population into subgroups using both the government’s allegations against detainees and detainee statements about their own affiliations and conduct.
    [Show full text]
  • Routledge Handbook of U.S. Counterterrorism and Irregular
    ‘A unique, exceptional volume of compelling, thoughtful, and informative essays on the subjects of irregular warfare, counter-insurgency, and counter-terrorism – endeavors that will, unfortunately, continue to be unavoidable and necessary, even as the U.S. and our allies and partners shift our focus to Asia and the Pacific in an era of renewed great power rivalries. The co-editors – the late Michael Sheehan, a brilliant comrade in uniform and beyond, Liam Collins, one of America’s most talented and accomplished special operators and scholars on these subjects, and Erich Marquardt, the founding editor of the CTC Sentinel – have done a masterful job of assembling the works of the best and brightest on these subjects – subjects that will continue to demand our attention, resources, and commitment.’ General (ret.) David Petraeus, former Commander of the Surge in Afghanistan, U.S. Central Command, and Coalition Forces in Afghanistan and former Director of the CIA ‘Terrorism will continue to be a featured security challenge for the foreseeable future. We need to be careful about losing the intellectual and practical expertise hard-won over the last twenty years. This handbook, the brainchild of my late friend and longtime counter-terrorism expert Michael Sheehan, is an extraordinary resource for future policymakers and CT practitioners who will grapple with the evolving terrorism threat.’ General (ret.) Joseph Votel, former commander of US Special Operations Command and US Central Command ‘This volume will be essential reading for a new generation of practitioners and scholars. Providing vibrant first-hand accounts from experts in counterterrorism and irregular warfare, from 9/11 until the present, this book presents a blueprint of recent efforts and impending challenges.
    [Show full text]
  • Crimes Committed by Terrorist Groups: Theory, Research and Prevention
    The author(s) shown below used Federal funds provided by the U.S. Department of Justice and prepared the following final report: Document Title: Crimes Committed by Terrorist Groups: Theory, Research and Prevention Author(s): Mark S. Hamm Document No.: 211203 Date Received: September 2005 Award Number: 2003-DT-CX-0002 This report has not been published by the U.S. Department of Justice. To provide better customer service, NCJRS has made this Federally- funded grant final report available electronically in addition to traditional paper copies. Opinions or points of view expressed are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice. Crimes Committed by Terrorist Groups: Theory, Research, and Prevention Award #2003 DT CX 0002 Mark S. Hamm Criminology Department Indiana State University Terre Haute, IN 47809 Final Final Report Submitted: June 1, 2005 This project was supported by Grant No. 2003-DT-CX-0002 awarded by the National Institute of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice. Points of view in this document are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice. This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice. TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract .............................................................. iv Executive Summary....................................................
    [Show full text]
  • Afghanistan: Politics, Elections, and Government Performance
    Afghanistan: Politics, Elections, and Government Performance Kenneth Katzman Specialist in Middle Eastern Affairs May 1, 2012 Congressional Research Service 7-5700 www.crs.gov RS21922 CRS Report for Congress Prepared for Members and Committees of Congress Afghanistan: Politics, Elections, and Government Performance Summary Building capacity and limiting corruption at all levels of Afghan governance are crucial to the success of a planned transition from U.S.-led NATO forces to Afghan security leadership. • The capacity of the formal Afghan governing structure has increased significantly since the Taliban regime fell in late 2001, but many positions at the local level are unfilled. Even though the formal governing structure remains weak, President Hamid Karzai’s Afghan and some U.S. critics assert that he has concentrated authority in Kabul through vast powers of appointment at all levels— appointment power given him by the Afghan constitution. • Addressing these criticism, Karzai has publicly and repeatedly denied assertions by opposing faction leaders that he wants to stay in office beyond the 2014 expiration of his second term and said in April 2012 that he is considering trying to move the next presidential election to 2013. Still, international efforts to curb fraud in two successive elections (for president in 2009 and parliament in 2010) largely failed and many believe election oversight has improved little since. • Nepotism and political considerations in hiring are entrenched in Afghan culture and limit development of a competent bureaucracy, as does widespread illiteracy. Karzai has accepted U.S. help to build emerging anti-corruption institutions, but these same institutions have sometimes caused a Karzai backlash when they have targeted his allies or relatives.
    [Show full text]
  • The “Journey of Death” 1
    THE JOURNEY OF DEATH – OVER 700 PRISONERS ILLEGALLY RENDERED TO GUANTANAMO BAY WITH THE HELP OF PORTUGAL 28 January 2008 THE “JOURNEY OF DEATH” 1 - OVER 700 PRISONERS ILLEGALLY RENDERED TO GUANTANAMO WITH THE HELP OF PORTUGAL - Reprieve can now conclusively show that Portuguese territory and airspace has been used to transfer over 700 prisoners to torture and illegal imprisonment in Guantanamo Bay. Through comparing flight logs obtained from Portuguese authorities, 2 information from the US Department of Defence showing dates of arrival of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, and unclassified testimony from many of the prisoners themselves, 3 Reprieve is for the first time able to name 728 prisoners rendered to Guantanamo Bay through Portuguese jurisdiction. 1 So said Adil Al-Zamil, prisoner transported on Flight RCH108Y through Portuguese jurisdiction to Guantanamo Bay: “I call the journey to Guantanamo ‘the journey of death.’ I discreetly wished that the plane would fall to end the pain I felt.” Source: Kuwaiti Gitmo Detainees Speak Out about Abuse, By Rania El Gamal, Kuwait Times, December 1, 2006 2 Flight logs obtained by Ana Gomes MEP in 2006 reveal that on at least 94 occasions aircraft crossed Portuguese airspace en route to or from Guantanamo Bay between 2002-2006 . On at least 6 occasions rendition aircraft flew directly from Lajes in the Azores to Guantanamo. See appendix for full copies of the logs. 3 The US Department of Defence has released ‘in-process’ records of Guantanamo inmates, detailing when prisoners were first weighed and measured on entry to the prison. It is possible confirm the identities of prisoners transported to Guantanamo through Portuguese jurisdiction by matching the ‘in- process’ dates of particular prisoners held in Guantanamo with flights contained in the Portuguese flight logs.
    [Show full text]
  • Precision in the Global War on Terror: Inciting Muslims Through the War of Ideas
    PRECISION IN THE GLOBAL WAR ON TERROR: INCITING MUSLIMS THROUGH THE WAR OF IDEAS Sherifa Zuhur April 2008 Visit our website for other free publication downloads http://www.StrategicStudiesInstitute.army.mil/ To rate this publication click here. This publication is a work of the U.S. Government as defined in Title 17, United States Code, Section 101. As such, it is in the public domain, and under the provisions of Title 17, United States Code, Section 105, it may not be copyrighted. ***** The views expressed in this report are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Department of the Army, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government. This report is cleared for public release; distribution is unlimited. ***** I want to thank many individuals for their assistance including SSI production staff, Liz Hall, W. Andrew Terrill, LTC Charles Wilson II, CH (COL) Kenneth Sampson and his colleagues at the Army Chaplains' first world religions conference, as well as various colleagues who study Islamism, and K. El Helbawy, H. Youssef, N. al-Shaer, H. Qafishah, and my many other interlocuters in the various periods of field research drawn on in this monograph. ***** Comments pertaining to this report are invited and should be forwarded to: Director, Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, 122 Forbes Ave, Carlisle, PA 17013-5244. ***** All Strategic Studies Institute (SSI) publications are available on the SSI homepage for electronic dissemination. Hard copies of this report also may be ordered from our homepage. SSI’s homepage address is: www.StrategicStudiesInstitute.army.mil.
    [Show full text]
  • 2 April 2020 "Generated on Refers to the Date on Which the User Accessed the List and Not the Last Date of Substantive Update to the List
    Res. 1267/1989/2253 List The List established and maintained pursuant to Security Council res. 1267/1989/2253 Generated on: 2 April 2020 "Generated on refers to the date on which the user accessed the list and not the last date of substantive update to the list. Information on the substantive list updates are provided on the Council / Committee’s website." Composition of the List The list consists of the two sections specified below: A. Individuals B. Entities and other groups Information about de-listing may be found at: https://www.un.org/securitycouncil/ombudsperson (for res. 1267) https://www.un.org/securitycouncil/sanctions/delisting (for other Committees) https://www.un.org/securitycouncil/content/2231/list (for res. 2231) A. Individuals QDi.400 Name: 1: IYAD 2: NAZMI 3: SALIH 4: KHALIL إﻳﺎد ﻧﻈﻤﻲ ﺻﺎﻟﺢ ﺧﻠﻴﻞ :(Name (original script Title: na Designation: na DOB: 1974 POB: Syrian Arab Republic Good quality a.k.a.: a) Ayyad Nazmi Salih Khalil b) Eyad Nazmi Saleh Khalil Low quality a.k.a.: a) Iyad al-Toubasi b) Iyad al-Tubasi c) Abu al-Darda' d) Abu-Julaybib al-Urduni e) Abu-Julaybib Nationality: Jordan Passport no: a) Jordan 654781 (approximately issued in 2009) b) Jordan 286062 (issued on 5 April 1999 at Zarqa, Jordan, expired on 4 April 2004) National identification no: na Address: Syrian Arab Republic (Coastal area of. Location as of April 2016) Listed on: 22 Feb. 2017 Other information: Leader of Al-Nusrah Front for the People of the Levant (QDe.137) for coastal area of Syrian Arab Republic since March 2016.
    [Show full text]
  • United States District Court for the Southern District of New York
    UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION; AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION FOUNDATION, Plaintiffs, DECLARATION OF JONATHAN HAFETZ v. 09 Civ. 8071 (BSJ) (FM) DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE; CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY; DEPARTMENT OF ECF Case STATE; DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, Defendants. DECLARATION OF JONATHAN HAFETZ I, Jonathan Hafetz, under penalty of perjury declare as follows: 1. I represent plaintiffs the American Civil Liberties Union and the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation in this action concerning a FOIA request that seeks from the Department of Defense (“DOD”) and other agencies records about, among other things, prisoners at Bagram Air Base (“Bagram”) in Afghanistan. 2. I submit this declaration in support of plaintiffs’ motion for partial summary judgment and in opposition to the DOD’s motion for partial summary judgment. The purpose of this declaration is to bring the Court’s attention to official government disclosures, as well as information in the public domain, concerning the citizenship, length of detention, and date, place, and circumstances of capture of detainees held at the Bagram and similarly-situated suspected terrorists and combatants in U.S. military custody at the U.S. Naval Base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba (“Guantánamo”). 1 Publicly-Available Information about Detainees at Bagram Prison 3. On April 23, 2009, plaintiffs submitted a Freedom of Information Act (“FOIA”) request to DOD, the Central Intelligence Agency, the Department of Justice and the State Department seeking ten categories of records about Bagram, including records pertaining to detainees’ names, citizenships, length of detention, where they were captured, and the general circumstances of their capture.
    [Show full text]
  • Volume XI, Issue 6 December 2017 PERSPECTIVES on TERRORISM Volume 11, Issue 6
    ISSN 2334-3745 Volume XI, Issue 6 December 2017 PERSPECTIVES ON TERRORISM Volume 11, Issue 6 Table of Contents Welcome from the Editors..................................................................................................................................3 Articles Thirty Years after its Foundation - Where is al-Qaida Going?.............................................5 by Anne Stenersen Revisiting al-Qaida’s Foundation and Early History.............................................................17 by Leah Farrall Al-Qaida and the Pakistani Harakat Movement: Reflections and Questions about the Pre-2001 Period............................................................................................................38 by Don Rassler The Jihadi Social Movement (JSM): Between Factional Hegemonic Drive, National Realities, and Transnational Ambitions................................................................55 by Jerome Drevon Jihadi Competition and Political Preferences........................................................................63 by Tore Hammin The Spread of its Message: Studying the Prominence of al-Qaida Materials in UK Terrorism Investigations..................................................................................................89 by Donald Holbrook Islamic State and Technology – a Literature Review...........................................................101 by Truls Tønnessen Islamic State and Al-Nusra: Exploring Determinants of Chemical Weapons Usage Patterns............................................................................................................................................112
    [Show full text]