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The Fall of Afghanistan, One Year Later

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The Fall of Afghanistan, One Year Later

Threat financing implications

Jessica Davis
Aug 16, 2022
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The Fall of Afghanistan, One Year Later

newsletter.insightthreatintel.com

This week in Insight Intelligence, we’re taking a look back at the last year in Afghanistan since the Taliban re-took control of the country. As many of you know, I’ve been writing quite a bit about it. My big concerns have been around threat financing: how are illicit actors (money launderers, corrupt officials, and of course terrorist groups) taking advantage of the Taliban’s reign for their financial activities? Here’s a collection of the work I’ve done on the issue, much of which is free to read.

The tl;dr

1
of all of this analysis is that a Taliban-controlled Afghanistan is a safe haven for many terrorist groups and illicit actors. They use the territory as a safe have from which to manage and fund their activities, including storing funds with Afghan hawaladars, raising funds from economic activities (including narcotics and other smuggling activities), using funds to acquire weapons and device components, exploiting Afghanistan’s porous borders and deep connections to the UAE to move funds, and of course using cash, hawalas, and bank transfers to obscure the source, destination, and use of funds.

For RUSI CFCS & the UK’s Serious Organised Crime & Anti-Corruption Evidence (SOC ACE) Research Programme, I wrote this piece on how various groups and actors use Afghanistan for illicit financing. In the Globe and Mail, I lamented Canada’s refusal to adapt our counter-terrorist financing laws to allow humanitarian aid into Afghanistan. And for Lawfare, I explored the challenges of understanding Taliban finance.

I also wrote a series (often with my colleague Lena here at Insight Intelligence) on various groups’ financing:

Insight Intelligence
More shadows than light: The Taliban's evolving finances
The Taliban has been in control of Afghanistan for a full 9 months now. In that time, the country has experienced a humanitarian crisis, a collapse of its economy, a rise in terrorist attacks, and almost complete global isolation. The Taliban faces significant economic challenges arising from this isolation and its status as a terrorist organization. In July of 2021, I wrote a brief analysis of Taliban finance, exploring how the group raises, uses, moves, stores, manages, and obscures its funds. This article serves as a short update to that analysis…
Read more
8 months ago · Jessica Davis
Insight Intelligence
ISIL-KP Financing
ISIL-KP continues to conduct attacks in Afghanistan, challenging the Taliban’s consolidation of control. This newsletter provides a brief overview of the group’s financing activities. This analysis was originally written for my book, Illicit Money: Financing Terrorism in the 21st Century…
Read more
8 months ago · Jessica Davis
Insight Intelligence
Cryptocurrency Meets Hawala
Welcome to a regular edition of Insight Intelligence. Finally, after a two-week interruption brought to us by the Ottawa occupation, we are back to our regularly-scheduled programming. Today we’re looking at the intersection of hawalas and cryptocurrency, so prepare to get very nerdy. As always, a warm welcome to our new subscribers (we are approaching 1000!), and a special thank you to the new paid subscribers! If you find this interesting, please subscribe and share it with a friend…
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a year ago · 1 like · Jessica Davis
Insight Intelligence
Financing the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan
Uzbekistan is seeking to work with the Afghan Taliban to take down a common enemy – the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU). The IMU was formed in 1998 and a year later, orchestrated an infamous series of attacks in the Uzbek capital of Tashkent in an attempt to assassinate the president…
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8 months ago · Elena Martynova
Insight Intelligence
East Turkestan Islamic Movement
Since the Taliban took power in August 2021, diplomatic allies of Afghanistan have been far and few between. Nonetheless, China remains one state willing to work with the Taliban government. One condition that Xi Jinping has for establishing diplomatic relations, however, is that the Taliban severs any connections it has to the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM). ETIM is an extremist group of Uyghurs that seeks to establish a sovereign nation (East Turkestan) in the Chinese Xinjiang province. The group’s activities were mostly restricted to conducting attacks on the…
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7 months ago · 1 like · Elena Martynova

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Internet-speak for too long, didn’t read.

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The Fall of Afghanistan, One Year Later

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