Following the collapse of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan in August 2021, the returning Afghan Taliban leadership declared a general amnesty for former government employees, military personnel, and political opponents. This promise was intended to stabilize the nascent administration, encourage national reconciliation, and project an image of moderation to the international community. However, evidence demonstrates a profound, systematic breach of this decree. Instead of amnesty, a policy of targeted arrests, disappearances, and extrajudicial killings has taken root, particularly in regions known for anti-Taliban resistance, such as Panjshir province.
The discrepancy between the Taliban’s diplomatic assurances and their actions on the ground is stark. The provided data highlights that the persecution is not incidental but pervasive. In Panjshir province, a hotbed of the anti-Taliban National Resistance Front (NRF), at least 15,543 individuals were arrested or went missing between 2021 and December 2025, with 543 confirmed deaths. The intensification of arrests in 2025, registering at least 1,800 new detentions, including 18 in Dare district in a single month, suggests a calculated policy rather than isolated incidents.
The recent arrest of five former Afghan army personnel from Panjshir in Parwan province serves as a microcosm of the violation. The detainees, including Colonel Sheram ullah and two biological brothers, were arrested despite the official general amnesty. Significantly, the victims span the social spectrum: former high-ranking military officers, former guards of high-profile political figures (like Mujeeb and Najmuddin, former guards of Vice President Abdullah Abdullah), former police officers (Saifuddin Shafazada), a doctor (Dr. Sahib Khan Mirza), a former judge (Abdul Mateen), and even ordinary citizens, including six young people collecting grass. This wide net indicates that the objective extends beyond neutralizing organized military opposition to enforcing widespread social coercion.
One primary driver behind the systematic targeting of former rivals is the strategic need to preempt any viable political or military opposition. By labeling former government forces and opponents as NRF and AFF terrorists, the Taliban constructs a rhetorical justification for summary executions and forced disappearances. This tactic serves as a self-fulfilling prophecy: those who might have remained compliant under a genuine amnesty are, through fear, pushed toward resistance.
The intense focus on Panjshir, where the NRF maintains a visible, if geographically contained, presence, underscores this coercive strategy. The arrests and violence are tools to suppress the population’s capacity for dissent, ensuring that the province remains pacified. The construction of a new prison in Bazarak district further confirms the long-term institutionalization of this repressive apparatus, signalling an intent to manage opposition through incarceration rather than reconciliation. These summary actions are calculated to break the social and tribal structure that has historically enabled resistance in the region.
Decentralized Command, Corruption, and Personal Vendettas
While strategic coercion is a central factor, the failure of the amnesty is equally attributable to weak central writ and the chaotic reality of decentralized power in a highly militarized society. The Taliban’s governance is often characterized by a crucial disconnect between the leadership’s diplomatic statements, intended for international consumption, and the brutal, opportunistic actions of local and middle-level commanders.
During the twenty-year insurgency, rivals from both sides developed personal knowledge and often deep-seated animosities. The collapse of the government has provided local Taliban commanders with impunity to settle these personal and tribal vendettas under the cover of official security operations. This decentralized brutality is compounded by corruption. The case of the five former army personnel arrested in Parwan illustrates this transactional abuse of power: they were allegedly detained only after they ran out of money and could not fulfill the local commander’s demand for 100,000 Afghanis per person. The accusation of NRF affiliation became a pretext for extortion, with the men being taken to the GDI center in Panjshair.
Furthermore, the appointment of hardline figures like Dr. Basheer, the head of the GDI in Panjshir, who is identified as an enemy of anyone who opposes the Taliban, suggests that lower-level commanders are allowed, or even encouraged, to operate with their own extremist or personal agendas, effectively making the central command’s amnesty promise moot. The inability of the central leadership to impose its writ, combined with the profitability of extortion, has transformed the amnesty breach into a quasi-official policy executed by local strongmen.
Historical Precedents
The current failure of the general amnesty should not be viewed as an aberration but as a continuation of the Taliban’s historical operational doctrine, which utilizes fear and summary violence to consolidate control over opposing populations. During their previous rule and periods of insurgency, the Taliban demonstrated a clear proclivity for targeted massacres as a method of ethnic and political cleansing. Two notorious examples serve as crucial precedents for current events.
In Mazar-i-Sharif in 1998, after seizing the city, Taliban forces engaged in a systematic campaign of killing, primarily targeting the Hazaras, perceived as political opponents. Hundreds, possibly thousands, of civilians were executed based on their ethnicity and suspected allegiance to anti-Taliban forces. This event established a pattern of mass violence against specific ethnic and sectarian communities following military victories. Similarly, the 2001 destruction of the Buddhas of Bamyan, while an act of cultural vandalism, was accompanied by severe repression and violence against the local Hazara population in the Bamyan province. These actions were not random acts of cruelty but calculated statements of dominance, designed to terrorize non-compliant communities into submission.
The systemic arrests and disappearances in Panjshir, a region predominantly inhabited by Tajiks and a historical bastion of anti-Taliban resistance, echoes the ethnically and politically targeted violence witnessed in Mazar-i-Sharif. The statistics and the explicit targeting of local leaders and former soldiers directly parallel the use of collective punishment and terror witnessed in the past. This historical context suggests that the amnesty violation is less about a breakdown of command and more about an established, albeit officially denied, strategy of consolidating power through elimination and exemplary punishment.
Domestic Ramifications
The systematic violation of the general amnesty carries severe, long-term domestic ramifications that compromise the prospect of stable governance.
First, the policy of coercion fundamentally erodes the Taliban’s legitimacy both domestically and internationally. A government that fails to uphold its foundational promise of reconciliation, a promise necessary for a post-conflict society, cannot earn the trust of its populace or secure recognition from foreign powers. This lack of trust is driving a continuous cycle of alienation.
Second, the targeting of former rivals acts as a radicalizing force, guaranteeing the persistence and potential expansion of armed opposition. When surrender or compliance leads to arrest and death, as seen in the execution of the former judge Abdul Mateen, the only logical choice for opponents becomes continued fighting. This ensures that the NRF, or successor movements, will continue to find willing recruits among those who feel betrayed and fear for their lives.
Finally, the targeting of civil society, doctors, judges, and teachers, is actively causing a brain drain and catastrophic damage to the nation’s social infrastructure. The disappearance of skilled professionals removes critical human capital necessary for rebuilding the country, condemning the nation to deeper structural poverty and reliance on foreign aid. These figures are not mere statistics; they represent “a son of a mother, a father’s support, or a father of a child.” The destruction of this societal fabric for the sake of short-term security consolidation ensures long-term instability and continued societal fracture.
The evidence from Panjshir and Parwan confirms that the Taliban’s general amnesty is an illusion, systematically violated by a complex mixture of strategic preemption, internal command failure, and rampant corruption, rooted in a historical proclivity for targeted violence. Driven by the strategic imperative to crush any potential opposition and exacerbated by the opportunistic cruelty of decentralized local commanders, the policy of arrests and disappearances is designed to enforce control through fear. While this may consolidate immediate power, it actively undermines any possibility of genuine national reconciliation. By prioritizing coercion over compromise, the Taliban is not laying the foundation for a stable, recognized government but rather sowing the seeds for renewed, protracted conflict, ensuring that Afghanistan’s future remains tragically defined by violence and mistrust.
Also See: The Nexus of Disinformation : How Afghanistan, India And Israel Shape Anti-Pakistan Narratives
