February 26, 2025, UnHerd: Taliban. The word is synonymous with religious fundamentalism — vividly clear since the militants swept back into Kabul in August 2021. Amid public executions and gender apartheid, there has been an intensifying war on free speech. Since the Taliban returned to power, media have been censored and radio stations in particular forced off the air. Yet, curiously, one foreign broadcaster endures: the BBC. On 1 December 2022, the Taliban issued a decree closing down the two local stations run by the BBC’s rivals: Voice of America and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.

February 13, 2025, National Post: She was 20 years old, dreaming of a fulfilled life. The smart, ambitious young woman was among 20 Afghan women and girls enrolled in a secret school, seeking knowledge and a future.But the Taliban were back in charge after Western forces withdrew from Afghanistan in September 2021, and they had different plans, as did her authoritarian, ultra-conservative father; she would marry an Afghan man of his choosing living in Turkey, a man she did not love.

February 5, 2025, CNN: The Taliban suspended the operation of Afghanistan’s only women’s radio station after raiding its premises on Tuesday, deepening the exclusion of women from public life and society since the group took power in 2021. Kabul-based Radio Begum – a station run by women with content aimed at women’s education – said officers from the Taliban’s information and culture ministry restrained the station’s staff as it searched its premises in the nation’s capital.

January 9, 2025, Times Now News: Ever since retaking power in 2021, the Taliban have ordered the most brutal reversal of women's rights. Women and girls have lost access to education, jobs, public spaces, and even basic rights—many of which most of us would take for granted. Women around the world have been fighting for their rights, and this has dealt a grievous blow to all those efforts. Upon their return, the Taliban have established the most regressive government. Actor Meryl Streep, who attended an event in September last year as part of the UN General Assembly in New York, spoke about the situation facing women and girls in Afghanistan.

January 9, 2025, Jurist News: The UK Independent Afghanistan Inquiry published Wednesday has shed light on allegations of unlawful killings carried out by British special forces in Afghanistan between 2010 and 2013. The inquiry, which examined classified military records, whistleblower accounts, and survivor testimonies, uncovered a disturbing pattern of behavior that raises serious questions about accountability and the rule of law in armed conflict.According to a video statement released Wednesday by Sir Charles Haddon-Cave, the chair of the inquiry, seven special forces witnesses were questioned in secret, more than ten years after they voiced concerns about alleged purposeful detention activities in Afghanistan.