COMMON ANALYSIS
Last update: June 2026
The analysis below is based on the following EUAA COI products: Country Focus 2026, 1.1., 1.1.1., 1.1.2., 1.2.1., 1.2.5., 1.2.8., 1.3., 2.1., 2.2.1., 4.1.2., Country Focus 2024, 1.1.1, 1.1.3., 1.2.1., 1.2.3., 1.2.4., 1.2.6., 4.1.2. 4.1.4.; Country Focus 2023, 1.1.3. 1.2.1., 1.2.2., 1.2.3., 4.4.2.; Country Guidance should not be referred to as a source of COI.
Since their takeover in August 2021, the Taliban maintain territorial and effective control over Afghanistan. Although the de facto authorities have met armed opposition by resistance groups and the Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP), it is considered that such opposition poses no significant challenge to the de facto authorities’ hold on territorial control.
The de facto authorities impose their religious ideology on the general population through numerous restrictions aimed at implementing sharia in order to ‘purify’ Afghan society, as reflected in the structure and function of their governance. The influential de facto Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (MPVPV) is responsible for enforcing the ‘Morality Law’ and other instructions of the de facto authorities that regulate the private lives of Afghans. Following the introduction of the law, additional enforcers have been deployed across Afghanistan. The Ministry reports directly to the Taliban Supreme Leader on important matters. Although it has in principle a more guiding role, the de facto MPVPV is allowed to detain individuals failing to comply or issue extra-judicial punishments. Additionally, reports indicate that the de facto MPVPV enforcers use force, including verbal intimidation, arrests, harassment, and physical violence.
The de facto MPVPV also cooperates with the de facto General Directorate of Intelligence (GDI), whose mandate allows for further coercive measures. Moreover, Afghan de facto authorities committed a wide range of human rights violations against various categories of individuals considered as critical or opponents of their religious and political agenda. Such violations included killings or enforced disappearances, arbitrary arrests and detentions, torture and ill-treatment as well as excessive violence in order to suppress protests. As a consequence of increasing surveillance of social media activities, numerous individuals have been arrested for posting content considered critical and/or ‘un-Islamic’ by the Taliban. Following a de facto court judgment, corporal and capital punishments have also been enforced. The Taliban’s policies on women are widely considered as ‘gender persecution’.
The Haqqani Network is a designated terrorist organisation in the EU, UK and the US, and is also on the UN Security Council’s sanctions list. It is known for having carried out high-profile attacks and suicide missions in the past. Members of the Network hold influential posts in the de facto government of the Taliban.
According to the UN, the de facto authorities in Afghanistan continued to maintain a permissive environment for a range of UN-designated terrorist groups, including Al-Qaida and its affiliates. There are conflicting assessments of Al-Qaida’s presence in Afghanistan. The UN Sanctions and Monitoring Team noted reports of Al-Qaida maintaining a presence in the country, although the group’s resources are limited and its operations have significantly downsized. It also noted reports of small, rudimentary training camps across the country, where allegedly both Al-Qaida and Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) fighters are trained. Other sources have questioned some of these reports, in particular those of Al-Qaida running overt training camps in Afghanistan.
For more information on the methods and tactics, see 4.3.3(a) Security situation in Afghanistan: recent events.