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Pentagon leaders to face Afghanistan reckoning in Congress

President Joe Biden’s top military leaders are expected to face some of the most contentious hearings in memory this week over the chaotic end to the war in Afghanistan, which cost the lives of U.S. troops and civilians and left the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (IEA) back in power.
The Senate and House committees overseeing the U.S. military will hold hearings on Tuesday and Wednesday, respectively, where Republicans are hoping to zero in on mistakes that Biden’s administration made toward the end of the two-decade-old war.
That will follow similar questioning two weeks ago that saw U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken staunchly defending the administration, even as he faced calls for his resignation.
U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin is expected to praise American personnel who helped airlift 124,000 Afghans out of the country, an operation that also cost the lives of 13 U.S. troops and scores of Afghans in a suicide bombing outside the Kabul airport.
Austin is expected to “be frank about the things we could have done better,” a U.S. official told Reuters.
That will also certainly include the U.S. military’s last drone strike before withdrawing, which the Pentagon acknowledges killed 10 civilians, most of them children – and not the Daesh (ISIS-K) militants it thought it was attacking.
Ahead of the hearing, Senator James Inhofe, the Senate Armed Services Committee’s top Republican, wrote to Austin with a long list of requests for information, including on the August 26 airport bombing, equipment left behind and the administration’s future counter-terrorism plans.
Senator Jeanne Shaheen, a Democrat, said lawmakers would also press about “a lack of coordination and a real plan for how we were going to get all the Afghans who helped us out of the country.”
“I don’t know if we’ll get answers. But questions will be raised again about why we got to the point that we did in Afghanistan,” she told Reuters in a telephone interview.
Many of the hardest questions may fall to the two senior U.S. military commanders testifying: Army General Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Marine General Frank McKenzie, head of U.S. Central Command.
McKenzie called the drone strike a “tragic mistake,” one that critics say raises hard questions about America’s ability to properly identify counter-terrorism targets in Afghanistan following the U.S. withdrawal.
But McKenzie and other U.S. officials will be under pressure to defend the Biden administration’s plans to address future counter-terrorism threats from groups like al Qaeda and Islamic State by flying in drones or commandos from overseas.
Republicans have accused the Biden administration of downplaying the risks associated with that so-called “over the horizon” capability.
Separately, Milley could face intense questioning over an account in a new book alleging he bypassed civilian leaders to place secret calls to his Chinese counterpart over concerns about former President Donald Trump.
Milley’s office pushed back against the report in the book, saying the calls he made were coordinated within the Pentagon and across the U.S. government.
Senator Marco Rubio has called for his resignation. Senator Rand Paul said he should be prosecuted if the account in the book was true. But some of the greatest concern has come from lawmakers in the House, where Milley will testify on Wednesday.
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Afghanistan and Iran swap prisoners at Milak border crossing
At the same time, two Iranians serving sentences in Afghan prisons were repatriated to Iran.

Afghanistan and Iran exchanged prisoners at the Milak border crossing in south-eastern Iran on Sunday, officials confirmed.
According to IRNA, almost 200 Afghan prisoners held in Iranian prisons in Tehran, Sistan and Baluchestan and Isfahan were handed over to Afghan authorities at the Milak border in Sistan and Baluchestan.
At the same time, two Iranians serving sentences in Afghan prisons were repatriated to Iran.
Iran’s Deputy Justice Minister for Human Rights and International Affairs, Askar Jalalian, said recently that more than 4,500 foreign nationals detained in Iran had been sent to their home countries.
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UNAMA chief visits northern Afghanistan, meets local officials including women

Roza Otunbayeva, Head of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), recently visited the city of Maimana in northern Afghanistan, where she met with local officials, entrepreneurs, and UN staff.
UNAMA wrote on its Facebook page on Sunday, that during the visit, entrepreneurs — including women — met with Otunbayeva, and requested support to facilitate access to new markets, particularly in Uzbekistan.
UNAMA further stated that among these entrepreneurs was a group of women who, with the support of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), had established a tailoring workshop.
They expressed their appreciation for the support received and spoke about the significant growth and development of their business.
UNAMA added that the organization remains committed to promoting economic opportunities and empowering Afghan communities, especially women.
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Senior Indian official meets with FM Muttaqi in Kabul

Anand Prakash, head of the Afghanistan, Iran and Pakistan Division of the Indian Ministry of External Affairs, met with Acting Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi in Kabul for talks on various issues.
According to a press release issued Sunday by the Afghan Foreign Ministry, bilateral political relations, trade, transit and recent political developments in the region were discussed in the meeting.
Muttaqi stressed the need for the expansion of diplomatic and economic relations between the two countries and explained that Afghanistan currently offers favorable opportunities for investment. He said Indian investors should take advantage of these opportunities.
He also said that facilities should be created for the movement of people between Afghanistan and India and the issuance of visas for medical purposes, students and businessmen should return to normal.
Meanwhile, Prakash said that relations with Afghanistan are important for India and he hopes that these relations will expand further in various fields.
He stressed that India will continue its cooperation with Afghanistan and wants to invest in some infrastructure projects and restart projects that were paused for some time.
The two sides also emphasized the expansion of relations, the exchange of delegations, visa facilitation and bilateral cooperation.
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