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Afghanistan cannot be left alone to fight ISIS, says Uzbekistan’s spy chief
Abdusalom Azizov said member countries need to consolidate efforts and coordinate measures to counter international terrorism
Uzbekistan’s Chairman of the State Security Service, Lieutenant General Abdusalom Azizov, on Wednesday acknowledged the Islamic Emirate’s fight against terrorism, especially against ISIS-K (Daesh), but said Afghanistan cannot be left to deal with the problem alone.
Addressing the opening session of 10th International Scientific-Practical Conference of the Regional Anti-Terrorist Structure of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) and the Second Conference of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) on Combating Terrorism and Extremism, which is currently being held in Tashkent, Azizov said the the situation requires SCO member countries to work together to fight the problem.
He said the complex and contradictory military-political processes taking place in the SCO and CIS space require member countries “to consolidate efforts and coordinate measures to counter international terrorism, religious extremism, and radicalism.”
He said the situation is aggravated by the fact that the leaders of international terrorist organizations have not abandoned their destructive plans against member nations.
“The government of Afghanistan, based on its capabilities and resources, counteracts international terrorism. The Afghan Special Service is at the ‘front line’ of the fight against ISIS and is achieving certain results. In this regard, Afghan partners cannot be left alone with this problem. The enemy must be defeated together, based on the principle of indivisibility of security”, Azizov emphasized.
He stated it was important to assist Afghanistan in the fight against the “Khorasan Province”, since weakening countermeasures will lead to strengthening the group, and this, in turn, threatens the security of the region.
He went on to say that only through joint efforts with consistent and coordinated work based on mutual trust, regular information exchange, and experience in combating international terrorism and extremism and countering cyber threats can effective results be achieved in ensuring stability and security in member countries.
The main goal of the conference is to exchange best practices in countering terrorism and extremism, develop measures to improve international cooperation in this area, and establish a unified understanding and approach among participants to new security challenges and threats.
In addition to SCO member countries, representatives from the United Nations, the Commonwealth of Independent States Anti-Terrorism Center (CIS ATC), Interpol, EAG (Eurasian Group), CICA (Conference on Interaction and Confidence-Building Measures in Asia), and others will also participate in the event.
The conference runs over two days – September 4 and 5.
The Embassy of Japan in Afghanistan announced on Friday that the country has allocated $19.5 million in humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan.
In a statement, the Japanese Embassy said it hopes the aid will help bring positive change to the lives of vulnerable Afghans.
According to the statement, the assistance will cover the basic humanitarian needs of vulnerable communities in Afghanistan.
The embassy added that the aid will be delivered through United Nations agencies, international organizations, and Japanese non-governmental organizations operating in Afghanistan.
Japan’s total assistance to Afghanistan since August 2021 has reached more than $549 million.
Security forces at the Islam Qala border in Herat province prevented hundreds of young Afghans from illegally entering Iran.
Officials from the 207 Al-Farooq Army Corps said that around 530 people attempted over the past two days to illegally enter Iranian territory through areas of Kohsan district in Herat, but border forces detained them and transferred them back to their original areas.
Meanwhile, officials in the local administration of Herat said that due to severe cold along the illegal migration route to Iran, three Afghan migrants have lost their lives in the Kohsan district of the province, and a shepherd has also died there for the same reason.
Mohammad Yousuf Saeedi, spokesperson for the Herat governor’s office, said that some statistics and images shared on social media regarding the incident are not reliable.
According to him, further investigations are underway to determine whether any individuals have died on the other side of the border.
President Donald Trump suspended the green card lottery program on Thursday that allowed the suspect in the Brown University and MIT shootings to come to the United States.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said in a post on the social platform X that, at Trump’s direction, she is ordering the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services to pause the program, the Associated Press reported.
“This heinous individual should never have been allowed in our country,” she said of the suspect, Portuguese national Claudio Neves Valente.
Neves Valente, 48, is suspected in the shootings at Brown University that killed two students and wounded nine others, and the killing of an MIT professor. He was found dead Thursday evening from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, officials said.
Neves Valente had studied at Brown on a student visa beginning in 2000, according to an affidavit from a Providence police detective. In 2017, he was issued a diversity immigrant visa and months later obtained legal permanent residence status, according to the affidavit. It was not immediately clear where he was between taking a leave of absence from the school in 2001 and getting the visa in 2017.
The diversity visa program makes up to 50,000 green cards available each year by lottery to people from countries that are little represented in the U.S., many of them in Africa. The lottery was created by Congress, and the move is almost certain to invite legal challenges.
Nearly 20 million people applied for the 2025 visa lottery, with more than 131,000 selected when including spouses with the winners. After winning, they must undergo vetting to win admission to the United States. Portuguese citizens won only 38 slots.
Lottery winners are invited to apply for a green card. They are interviewed at consulates and subject to the same requirements and vetting as other green-card applicants.
Trump has long opposed the diversity visa lottery. Noem’s announcement is the latest example of using tragedy to advance immigration policy goals. After an Afghan man was identified as the gunman in a fatal attack on National Guard members in November, Trump’s administration imposed sweeping rules against immigration from Afghanistan and other counties.
While pursuing mass deportation, Trump has sought to limit or eliminate avenues to legal immigration. He has not been deterred if they are enshrined in law, like the diversity visa lottery, or the Constitution, as with a right to citizenship for anyone born on U.S. soil. The Supreme Court recently agreed to hear his challenge to birthright citizenship.
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