{"id":46328,"date":"2025-04-18T05:34:32","date_gmt":"2025-04-18T05:34:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/?p=46328"},"modified":"2025-04-18T05:35:11","modified_gmt":"2025-04-18T05:35:11","slug":"us-weapons-left-in-afghanistan-sold-to-militant-groups-sources-tell-bbc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/?p=46328","title":{"rendered":"US weapons left in Afghanistan sold to militant groups, sources tell BBC"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

BBC: <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Half a million weapons obtained by the Taliban in Afghanistan have been lost, sold or smuggled to militant groups, sources have told the BBC – with the UN believing that some have fallen into the hands of al-Qaeda affiliates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Taliban took control of around one million weapons and pieces of military equipment – which had mostly been funded by the US – when it regained control of Afghanistan in 2021<\/a>, according to a former Afghan official who spoke to the BBC anonymously.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the Taliban advanced through Afghanistan in 2021, many Afghan soldiers surrendered or fled, abandoning their weapons and vehicles. Some equipment was simply left behind by US forces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The cache included American-made firearms, such as M4 and M16 rifles, as well as other older weapons in Afghan possession that had been left behind from decades of conflict.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sources have told the BBC that, at the closed-door UN Security Council’s Sanctions Committee in Doha late last year, the Taliban admitted that at least half of this equipment is now “unaccounted” for.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A person from the committee said they had verified with other sources that the whereabouts of half a million items was unknown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a report in February<\/a>, the UN stated that al-Qaeda affiliates, including Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, and Yemen’s Ansarullah movement, were accessing Taliban-captured weapons or buying them on the black market.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The BBC put this to Hamdullah Fitrat, deputy spokesperson for the Taliban government, who told the BBC it took the protection and storage of weapons very seriously.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“All light and heavy weapons are securely stored. We strongly reject claims of smuggling or loss,” he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BBC: Half a million weapons obtained by the Taliban in Afghanistan have been lost, sold or smuggled to militant groups, sources have told the BBC – with the UN believing that some have fallen into the hands of al-Qaeda affiliates. The Taliban took control of around one million weapons and pieces of military equipment – which had mostly been funded by the US – when it regained control of Afghanistan in 2021, according to a former Afghan official who spoke to the BBC anonymously. As the Taliban advanced through Afghanistan in 2021, many Afghan soldiers surrendered or fled, abandoning their weapons… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":46329,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-46328","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-in-english"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46328","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=46328"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46328\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46331,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46328\/revisions\/46331"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/46329"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=46328"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=46328"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=46328"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}