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Atta Noor elected chair of Jamiat splinter group
Delegates attending a congress of the Jamiat-e-Islami faction led by Atta Mohammad Noor on Thursday elected Noor as their party chairman.
Noor secured the majority of votes, with 65 out of 75; while Hafiz Mansour secured seven and three votes went to Qadrieh Yazdanparast.
The election came after at least three people were killed and four others wounded in a shooting earlier in the day. The incident happened after delegates had gathered for the meeting at a hotel close to the airport in Kabul city.
Noor only arrived after the incident but said later the attack had been the work of his political opponents and was worse than a terrorist attack.
The shooting started at 10:20 am as delegates were gathering and carried on until about 1 pm until Special Forces arrived and brought the situation under control.
Reports indicate at least six gunmen were involved in the shooting.
“Several gunmen wanted to disrupt the event,” one delegate told ArianaNews.
“Our opponents wanted to prevent the congress from taking place,” another delegate said.
Once the situation was brought under control, key figures including Noor, Mohammad Ismail Khan, and Younis Qanuni arrived at the venue.
“It was a cowardly and terrorist attack,” said Noor.
“In the current situation, Jamiat party unity is very important,” said another key member, Enayatullah Shadab.
Witnesses to the incident added that the shooting was carried out by individuals who opposed the holding of a Jamiat congress led by Noor.
“Today, a splinter group of the Jamiat under the name of Congress held a conference that has no affiliation with the Islamic Jamiat of Afghanistan and has no legal validity,” said Abdul Fattah Ahmadzai, a spokesman of Jamiat-e-Islami Afghanistan.
Disputes within the party have escalated over the past eight months between Salahuddin Rabbani and Noor, reportedly over the holding of the Jamiat Party congress.
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UNESCO: 2.4 million Afghan girls denied education since 2021
UNESCO estimates that the ban could force around 600,000 Afghan women out of the workforce by 2066 and cause $9.6 billion in lost income. It could also increase the risk of early marriage.
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) said on Tuesday around 2.4 million Afghan girls have been denied secondary education since the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (IEA) returned to power in 2021.
In a statement on Tuesday, UNESCO said Afghanistan is the only country in the world where girls and women are officially barred from secondary and higher education.
The organization warned that the restrictions could increase poverty, reduce employment opportunities and cause long-term damage to Afghanistan’s future.
UNESCO estimates that the ban could force around 600,000 Afghan women out of the workforce by 2066 and cause $9.6 billion in lost income. It could also increase the risk of early marriage.
Girls’ secondary schools were closed in March 2022, followed by a ban on women attending universities in December of the same year. The IEA initially described the restrictions as temporary, but they remain in place.
UNESCO also warned that the restrictions could worsen Afghanistan’s shortage of female teachers. It estimates the country could face a shortage of more than 11,000 qualified female teachers by 2030.
The organization said more than 90% of 10-year-old children in Afghanistan cannot read a simple text, while the national literacy rate is around 37%.
Nearly half of the country’s schools also lack adequate access to water, sanitation or heating, UNESCO said.
According to the report, around three million people returned to Afghanistan in 2025, putting further pressure on the education system. Since 2021, earthquakes, floods and other natural disasters have also forced around 1,000 schools to close.
Russia’s Power Machines Company is interested in investing in the rehabilitation and modernization of Afghanistan’s power plants, Da Afghanistan Breshna Sherkat (DABS) said on Tuesday.
DABS Chief Executive Officer Abdul Haq Hamkar discussed the potential investment with technical officials from Power Machines, with talks focusing on rehabilitating existing power plants, modernizing equipment and expanding power-generation capacity.
According to DABS, Hamkar said the company would cooperate in facilitating preliminary technical assessments of Afghanistan’s power plants and in exploring investment opportunities in the sector.
Denis Rudakov, head of Power Machines’ commercial department, said the Russian company plans to conduct preliminary technical assessments of existing power plants in Afghanistan.
Based on the findings, Power Machines will prepare proposals for rehabilitating facilities, modernizing equipment and increasing electricity-generation capacity, DABS said.
Afghanistan currently has several operational power plants, while efforts are underway to increase their generation capacity and upgrade their equipment, according to DABS.
Zabihullah Mujahid, spokesman for the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (IEA), on Tuesday denied that IEA authorities detained Mahmood Shah Habibi, an Afghan-American businessman the US claims disappeared in Kabul four years ago.
“We have no information about Mahmood Shah Habibi. He is not with the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. If he were, this issue would have been resolved long ago,” Mujahid said.
His remarks came a day after the FBI marked the fourth anniversary of Habibi’s disappearance and renewed its appeal for information about his whereabouts.
According to the FBI, Habibi disappeared near his home in Kabul on August 10, 2022. At the time, he was working as a consultant for Asia Consultancy Group, a Kabul-based telecommunications company. He had previously served as Afghanistan’s director of civil aviation.
The FBI has alleged that Habibi was detained by the IEA’s General Directorate of Intelligence.
The FBI has continued its investigation and in 2025 released a missing-persons poster for Habibi. The U.S. State Department has also offered a reward of up to $5 million for information leading to his location, recovery and return.
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