Books urging Afghans to join jihad have been widely distributed in the country’s southern province. ISI, Pakistan’s spy agency, has published and distributed more than 20,000 jihadi books. The books were sent through the Torkham border between Pakistan and Afghanistan. Pakistan has stepped in to maintain instability in the country amid peace talks with the Taliban in Afghanistan. Earlier, leaflets and letters were distributed to locals and staff in northern and central Afghanistan urging them to join the militant group. The letters instructed everyone to quit their jobs and join the Taliban.
US President Donald Trump has said he will withdraw all US troops from Afghanistan by the end of this year. This was followed by the move by ISI. In the 1990s, the Pakistani Taliban provided all kinds of support. Pakistan was one of the few countries to recognize the Taliban government at the time. A senior Afghan official has said that Pakistan believes that the United States will withdraw from Afghanistan as part of the ongoing peace talks and that the Taliban will seize the opportunity to act.
Meanwhile, the Afghan army had detected and defused 4776 IEDs the previous day. It was clear that the Taliban was behind this. However, the Afghan military found that the ammonium nitrate and white phosphorus used in the IEDs were imported from Pakistan. When it was reported, Pakistan said it would look into the matter. Earlier, intelligence had reported that Pakistan was trying to smuggle about 50 Afghan militants trained by Pakistan’s ISI into India.
