Created six years ago by disaffected Pakistani Taliban, ISIS-K has carried out dozens of attacks in Afghanistan this year.
WASHINGTON — The United States has been battling the Taliban and their militant partners in Afghanistan, al-Qaida and the Haqqani network, for 20 years.
A United Nations report in June concluded that 8,000 to 10,000 fighters from Central Asia, the North Caucasus region of Russia, Pakistan and the Xinjiang region in western China have poured into Afghanistan in recent months. Most are associated with the Taliban or al-Qaida, the report said, but others are allied with ISIS-K.
The leaders of the Islamic State group in Afghanistan denounced the Taliban takeover of the country, criticizing their version of Islamic rule as insufficiently hard line, and the two groups have fought in recent years. These three entities are inextricably linked, Clarke said, and in fact, have grown closer over the past decade, a trend that is likely to continue after the U.S. withdrawal, especially as they close ranks against adversaries like ISIS-K and the growing resistance movement in Afghanistan’s north.
“They have not been a first-tier ISIS affiliate, but with the Afghan commandos gone and the American military gone, does that give them breathing room? It could,” said Seth G. Jones, an Afghanistan specialist at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. “Since many ISIS commanders and fighters were once part of al-Qaida or an al-Qaida franchise, it is not surprising that there should be this contact,” said Bruce Hoffman, a terrorism scholar at the Council on Foreign Relations. “In most cases, this contact has not produced any lasting reconciliation.”
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