Kunduz faces tough resurrection after brief

Taliban takeover

Afg
han National Police on duty at the central square in Kunduz City on Tuesday. The square
became a symbolic focal point during fighting between the Taliban and Afghan security
forces in recent weeks. (Andrew Quilty/For The Washington Post)

By Sudarsan Raghavan-October 21

KUNDUZ, AFGHANISTAN There were no computers, no projectors, no

microscopes and no cameras inside the classrooms of Kunduz University. Outside, the
schools tractor and jeep were gone. Taliban fighters had stolen them all, fleeing with
refrigerators and even doors ripped from their hinges.
We worked hard for 13 years to collect all this equipment, said Abdul Quduz Zarifi,
the universitys president, seated near a classroom wall pierced with bullet holes. All
was gone in one week.
When it seized this northern city three weeks ago, the Taliban did not just destroy the
present. It sought to maim the future of Kunduz, too.
The insurgents torched local government offices and buildings vital to the functioning

of society: to bolster agriculture, to build up rural and urban areas, to house elected
officials, and to fight narcotics. They destroyed part of the electricity and water
department and devastated police stations. Shops and businesses were caught in
crossfire. The Central Bank branch was looted; other banks were bombed, making it
difficult for salaries to be paid. The insurgents also used mosques and schools as
bases.
The educational system has completely stopped operating, Zarifi said. The
universities and schools are paralyzed.

A week after the Taliban withdrew from this strategic city, the first the group had
captured since its collapse after the 9/11 attacks, Kunduz is scarred, physically and
psychologically. Residents who stayed during the siege are coming to grips with the
damage, which could cost millions for the cash-strapped government to repair, while
thousands who fled are returning home with fear and uncertainty.
True, the markets have reopened, and traffic is bustling again. In the Central Square,
where the Taliban planted its white flag atop a traffic circle post, the Afghan flag now
flies. American-trained Afghan special forces patrol in their tan Humvees. But
underneath the veneer of normality is an uneasy sense that the insurgents could strike
again.
The villages around the city are under the Taliban control, said Commander Ghafar,
who heads an Afghan Local Police unit, one of the many community ALP militias the
government has enlisted to fight the insurgents. (Like many Afghans, Ghafar uses one
name.) They are heavily armed. If they dont get pushed out of these villages, the city
will never be safe.
[U.S. troops dispatched to Kunduz to help Afghan forces]
The Taliban still controls most of Chardara, a district less than three miles southwest of
the city. Afghan troops fire rockets and mortar rounds into surrounding areas, and
helicopter gunships ply the skies. The Taliban sends rockets and mortar rounds back

at the Afghan positions. And some parts of the city remain no-go zones: Taliban
fighters, local officials say, could still be hiding inside houses.
On Sept. 28, the Taliban captured Kunduz after besieging the provincial capital for
months, delivering a major blow to the U.S.-backed Afghan government and its
security forces. Thousands of Afghan soldiers and police officers here couldnt stop a
few hundred insurgents who took control within hours of advancing into the city. As
many as 100,000 residents fled to other districts and provinces, according to U.N. and
provincial officials. Many others were trapped in crossfire.
The takeover prompted U.S. airstrikes to help the Afghan security forces regain
territory, but among the sites hit was a Doctors Without Borders hospital, the only
trauma hospital in the region. The strike pummeled the facility, killing 22 and injuring
dozens more. The U.S. military has since described it as a mistake, and several
investigations are underway.

Three cleaners leave the MSF Kunduz Trauma Center at the end of their day's work on Wednesday, about two and
a half weeks after the hospital was attacked by a U.S. AC-130 gunship on Oct. 3. (Andrew Quilty/For The
Washington Post)

In interviews across the city this week, residents and officials described how
insurgents swept into government offices, including the intelligence and security
agencies, and stole laptops, computers and hard drives containing thousands of
names and contacts of security force personnel, activists, journalists and civil
servants. Then they systematically targeted anyone opposed to them, creating a hit list

and deploying death squads.

A group of 10 Taliban fighters arrived at the green gate of Turdi Bai. They were looking
for his 26-year-old son, Ismatullah. A year and a half ago, the former bodyguard
stopped a Taliban suicide bomber from assassinating Mir Alam, a well-known progovernment militia commander. Ismatullah lost both his legs in the blast.
Please spare my son, Bai recalled begging the fighters. He cant do anything now.
He has no legs.
The fighters refused. Were here to send you to the next world, one said.
[Afghan response to hospital bombing is muted, even sympathetic]
Ismatullah crawled across the courtyard and held his fathers hand and asked him not
to beg anymore. Then, he crawled outside the compound, followed by the fighters.
There, they shot five bullets into his abdomen.
Later, the Taliban burned Mir Alams mansion. Yet in many other areas, the insurgents
left residents alone. A drive around the city revealed that most houses and stores were
untouched, save those that were caught in the exchange of gunfire between the
insurgents and government forces. No jewelry shops reported being looted, and the
Taliban provided a hotline for complaints.
The insurgents were looking in particular for government workers and officials, said
Jaleel Sabiri, 21, a university student. The two-story house of his neighbor, a
government official, was razed.
Some

The third floor of the burned-out home of Mir

Alam, a powerful Kunduz militia leader who fled
Kunduz when it came under attack from the
Taliban, on Oct. 20. (Andrew Quilty/For The
Washington Post)

A militia fighter guards the burned-out home of

Mir Alam on Tuesday. Several buildings on his
property were destroyed using what were believed
to be IEDs. (Andrew Quilty/For The Washington
Post)

allegations of abuses committed by the Taliban were false. At the womens hostel at
Kunduz University, local Afghan television networks reported that the militants raped
many of the students. The Taliban denied the reports and said it would target reporters
from those networks. In interviews, three employees of the hostel said it had been
closed for the Muslim Eid al-Adha holiday when the Taliban arrived.

There were no girls here, said Mustapha Nazeri, the guard at the hostel, where red
roses bloomed in the yard. They all left seven days before Eid.
Human rights activists say that other women were raped, especially relatives of
government employees and the Afghan Local Police units. Many female activists and
journalists have fled the city, raising concerns that efforts to improve womens rights
could slide backward. Local officials have also fled, crippling the city government.
Most have yet to return. Mir Alam, the commander, is still in Kabul, said his nephew
Noor. And when reached by phone, the head of the provincial council said he feared
returning because the Taliban could retake the city.
The people who are brave are back, said Hamdullah Danishi, the provincial
governor. Those who arent brave are not back.

Kunduz citizens enter the governor's offices on Tuesday to gain an audience with Hamdullah Danishi, his staff or
provincial councillors who also share the space. (Andrew Quilty/For The Washington Post)

Sayed Mohibullah, 70, came back with 12 relatives on Tuesday. They had fled with
only the clothes on their backs to Faryab province, a place they had fled 16 years ago
during the Taliban rule. As he stepped into his house, Mohibullah was consumed by a
fear of the future. During the clashes on his street where residents said two civilians
were killed in the crossfire and their bodies left on the ground for four days his
bakery shop, attached to the house, was destroyed.
My workers have not returned, and I dont have money to rebuild my bakery, he
lamented.

In another neighborhood, Mahajer Agha returned from Kabul to find his barbershop,
along with the whole building that contained it, a charred hulk.
Im jobless now, he said, standing in front of his shops remains. I have lost my
equipment, I have lost everything.
Across this city, theres palpable anger at President Ashraf Ghanis government, the
Afghan security forces and the militias for failing to protect the city. Many blame them
for neglecting the province, even as the Taliban was at the citys doorstep for months.
Others said abuses committed by the ALPs and other pro-government militias led
more people to sympathize with the Taliban. Some openly yearned for the days of
Ghanis predecessor, Hamid Karzai, who led the country until last year.
Under Karzai, no province or city fell to the Taliban, said Ghulam Rabbani, a
provincial council member. Many people here now think it was a wrong decision to
have supported Ghani for president.
At Kunduz University, no one knows when the doors will open again. Zarifi said the
police needed to guarantee security before the 5,000 students can return.

Boys play soccer on a field at dusk in Kunduz on Tuesday. Three weeks after the
Taliban overran the city and two weeks since Afghan forces began to take parts of it
back, things appeared to be returning to normal. (Andrew Quilty/For The Washington
Post)

As they withdrew from Kunduz, the Taliban members took with them heavy artillery,
Humvees and large amounts of ammunition belonging to the Afghan security forces,
local officials said. They also freed hundreds of inmates from the prison, who
presumably joined them.
Mohammed Naim, 47, is not staying. On Tuesday, he packed his wife and children into
his taxi, already brimming with their possessions. I dont have confidence in the
Afghan security forces, Naim said. Now, its quiet. But the fighting can easily erupt
here again after one or two months.
So they were fleeing, he said, to the northern town of Mazar-e Sharif.
Mohammad Sharif contributed to this report.
Read more:
The bloody history of Kunduz, from Afghanistans Convoy of Death to now
In Kunduz, echoes of a 1988 guerrilla assault after the Soviets withdrew
Today's coverage from Post correspondents around the world
Sudarsan Raghavan has been The Post's Kabul bureau chief since 2014. He was
previously based in Nairobi and Baghdad for the Post.
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