Afghans left behind again?
Plus a Cook's tour of Russia and Iran, China and rain-seeding drones
One year after the final U.S. military evacuation flight took off from Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, thousands of Afghans remain in temporary housing at a facility in the Persian Gulf. But the State Department is trying to shut down operations there, without processing thousands of Afghans one expert told me “are among the most vulnerable we’ve worked with.” These include about 1,700 Afghan Christians and Hazara Muslims subject to death threats under the Taliban but consistently refused admittance to the United States under humanitarian parole and other categories—my story today at The Dispatch.
Welcome to this August 26 edition of Globe Trot. When the world seems cruel, as in this and many weeks, we may ask with the poet F.W.H. Myers, “Is there not wrong too bitter for atoning?” What we fail to see are “Desperate tides of the whole great world's anguish / Forced thro' the channels of a single heart.” (Saint Paul)
Afghanistan: In eastern provinces Afghans face the aftermath of terrific flash floods that have destroyed grape harvests and other crops. After two decades of hard-won gains, the country under Taliban rule is sinking into deep crisis, with 97 percent of households unable to meet basic needs and prices, as elsewhere, spiraling up.
Meanwhile in Kabul, the Taliban’s Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice issued a directive making prayers obligatory at local mosques and ordering the closure of businesses during prayer times. It also has banned music at weddings. Local imams will enforce the decrees.
Deploying the imams on Taliban business has consequences for Afghans outside Afghanistan, including refugees in Abu Dhabi, as I learned:
Christians in the facility report they are socially excluded from the Afghan community, according to a March report prepared by Shai Fund that was shared with the State Department and others. As an example, an Afghan imam supervising one block of the compound pressured Christians to attend Friday prayers. He gave a talk saying he knew who the Christian families were.
Some Christians said that cluster managers in the compound (Afghans who serve as managers over each block of rooms) denied them basic supplies. Others reported finding Qurans left in their rooms. Several said they were harassed by translators, making them fearful of the translators and thus even more isolated.
Ukraine: President Volodymyr Zelensky delivered a surprise remote address on Wednesday during a U.N. Security Council meeting, accusing Russia of putting the world on the "brink of radiation catastrophe" by taking military action near Europe's largest nuclear plant.
Six months into the war in Ukraine, the head of Ukrainian Baptist Theological Seminary says the country has lost 400 Baptist congregations.
A missile strike in June damaged Sukovska Baptist church (Scott Olson / Getty Images)
Russia plans to use Iran as a backdoor to circumvent international sanctions over Ukraine if Tehran’s nuclear accord with world powers comes back into force. Also-sanctioned Iran provides a backup route to sell sanctioned Russian crude oil — the Kremlin's chief source of hard currency. (I would like an expert to shed more light, but relying primarily on sanctions in the face of naked aggression may have its limits.)
This get-out-of-jail-free card depends on whether the atomic deal, under which Iran would limit its nuclear activities in return for sanctions relief, is renewed. Many diplomats involved in the talks say a deal is close, though neither the U.S. nor Iran has accepted the EU's latest proposal. Among the proposal's most vocal supporters is Mikhail Ulyanov, Russia's ambassador to Vienna-based international organizations, including the U.N.'s International Atomic Energy Agency.
Keep in mind that the P5 + 1 talks that led to the 2015 nuclear deal, which President Joe Biden hopes to revive, involve Russia, a permanent member of the UN Security Council.
Myanmar: Before the February 2021 military coup, Chin State in western Burma (or Myanmar) was relatively peaceful, primarily because the Tatmadaw (Burma Army) had no interests in the mountainous, sparsely populated, resource-poor region. My friend Elizabeth Kendal has an excellent overview of the junta’s campaign of violence and its forced conversions to Buddhism in the quest to crush pro-democracy enclaves.
The former British ambassador to Myanmar, Vicky Bowman, along with her Burmese husband, renowned artist Htein Lin, were arrested Wednesday and taken from their home in Yangon to Insein Prison. The charges appear to be quid pro quo for new British sanctions.
China is deploying massive drones to seed rainclouds in Sichuan province in an effort to end a devastating drought.
Syria: The Kurdish-led YPG swept Al-Hol displacement camp yesterday in a military operation, detaining 27 residents suspected in recent terror attacks. Al-Hol is a tinderbox, ISIS cells and former ISIS families living side by side, with no coordinated international effort to determine the fate of those captured in 2019.
Last Friday a federal court sentenced Islamic State member El Shafee Elsheikh to life in prison for his role in the kidnapping and subsequent beheading of journalists James Foley and Steven Sotloff, the killing of aid workers Kayla Mueller and Peter Kassig. Here’s my 2019 look at the unanswered questions in the Kayla Mueller case and the role of Elsheikh.
South Korea is holding onto its record for the lowest fertility rate in the world
I’m consuming… “The Rest Is History” podcast’s August series on Victorian holidays. Historians Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook are a lively duo, plus you learn things like: Sir Thomas Cook, the inventor of the Cook’s tour, was a Baptist who got his start hosting tour group excursions for temperance gatherings. Upcoming: The two plan a series on J.R.R. Tolkien. (Also: Nassim Nicholas Taleb has a new essay, “On Christianity,” as a foreword to Tom Holland’s remarkable book, Dominion.)
An interesting roundup of news items that don’t make it onto British mainstream news. Thanks.