UCDP

General information

Part of Conflict: Afghanistan: Islamic State

Date of first stated goals of incompatibility: 2015-01-26
Comment on date of first stated goal of incompatibility: The Islamic State (IS) has its origins in Iraq (for more information about the group see Iraq: Islamic State). In late June 2014, IS announced that it had established a caliphate in parts of Syrian and Iraq. The leader of the group, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, was appointed caliph. Sharia law was imposed in areas under its control and governors (wālī, or wulāt in plural) were appointed for different geographical locations.

During the autumn of 2014, several groups pledged allegiance, bay’ah, to IS. On 13 November 2014, al-Baghdadi accepted the bay’ah from groups based in Yemen, Libya, Egypt and Saudi Arabia. IS stated that by accepting the pledges from the groups, al-Baghdadi became “the imam and khalīfah for the Muslims everywhere”. Furthermore, it stated that the “legality of all emirates, groups, states, and organizations, becomes null by the expansion of the khilāfah’s authority and arrival of its troops to their areas”.

During 2014, reports emerged of the presence of the IS in Afghanistan and Pakistan. By the end of the year, some local commanders had pledged allegiance (bay’ah) to IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

On 10 January 2015, six former TTP (Tehrik-I Taliban Pakistan) leaders released a video in which they again pledged allegiance to IS and nominated Hafiz Khan Saeed as the leader of the group. Two weeks later, on 26 January, IS accepted the bay’ah. In the official audio statement “Say, Die in your rage!”, the IS spokesman Abu Muhammad al-Adnani announced the expansion of the Islamic State, creating Wilayah Khorasan (Khorasan Province). Khorasan refers to an historical region covering parts of modern-day Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The statement appointed Hafiz Khan Saeed as Khorasan Province’s governor (wali), and Mullah Abdul Rauf as his deputy.

Date of first use of armed force: 2015-02-09
Comment on date of first use of armed force: The first event that has been possible to connect to the IS in Khorasan took place in early February 2015, when a US drone targeted the deputy leader of the IS in Afghanistan, Mullah Abdul Rauf, in Hilmand province. Six militants, including the deputy leader, were killed in the attack.
First Battle Related Death: 2015-02-09
Comment on First Battle Related Death: In early February 2015, a US drone targeted the deputy leader of the IS in Afghanistan, Mullah Abdul Rauf, in Hilmand province. Six militants, including the deputy leader, were killed in the attack.

Date when dyad reached 25 battle releated deaths: 2015-03-03
Comment on date when dyad reached 25 battle related deaths: IS grew stronger in Afghanistan during the first months of 2015, and by early March fighting between the Afghan government, supported by US airstrikes, and IS Khorasan had resulted in at least 25 battle-related deaths.

Conflict issues

Conflict Goal Issues: Islamic State, al-Dawla al-Islamiya, (IS) was a Salafist-Sunni Islamist global rebel group that emerged in Iraq and Syria in 2004. The group originally emerged with the goals of toppling the Iraqi regime and replacing the government with an Islamic state with Sharia law as well as ousting the occupying forces currently residing in the country, but its goals drastically shifted as it grew in size to wish to establish a global Islamic caliphate governed by Sharia law. Whilst the group was international for the majority of its existence, IS is considered a rebel group involved in several dyads as the group fought against, and attempted to overthrow, several individual governments as part of its international aims, and has been coded as such. However, many IS statements were not pertaining to specific countries, and the project has, hence, chosen to code them as pertaining to all countries with significant IS presence. Finally, whilst various groups have claimed allyship and adherence to IS, only statements from official IS groups have been coded by the project as legitimate sources for interpreting conflict issues. The Afghanistan-IS dyad became active in 2015, following its declaration of intent to establish a global caliphate, and the group pronounced several conflict goal issues during its first active year. During this year, they stated its intent in reclaiming ‘the land of Khorasan’ (an area encompassing parts of Iran, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Pakistan, and Afghanistan) calling for the establishment of jihad and the Shariah. Apart from changing the political and judicial system in Afghanistan, and Khorasan as a whole, the group also called for the restriction of non-Muslim religious rights: "Know that the Islamic Caliphate is not limited to a particular country. These young men will fight against every disbeliever, whether in the west, east, south, or north."

As the conflict progressed, IS would continuously emphasize its intent to establish an Islamic State in Afghanistan and Khorasan and frequently mentioned its discontent with ‘apostates’ (Muslims who do not adhere to Islamic faith) calling for the religious rights of non-Muslims to be restricted. In 2017, the last coded year of conflict, the group also called for Muslim religious rights to be respected and for the ousting of, among others, the Afghan government. Apart from its first year of existence, IS were not interpreted as reemphasizing its intent to establish Sharia law, although this does not imply intentions to not do so, as Sharia law was continuously emphasized as a vital part of the establishment of an Islamic State by IS in other countries.

Throughout the coded conflict, IS continuously noted its intentions to establish an Islamic State in Afghanistan and Khorasan and called for the restriction of religious rights of non-believers and apostates. These are to be considered the main conflict goal issues of the group, as they were also continuously stated with heavy emphasis.

Conflict Dynamics Issues: During the first year of conflict, IS released one statement pertaining to conflict dynamics issues against the Afghan state. They called for the removal of foreign influence from Khorasan, particularly mentioning "the crusaders, the Jews and tyrants." This also indicates calls for collective targeting of Jewish people and of occupiers in Afghanistan.

These issues were stated once more each as the conflict progressed. The group also called for the collective targeting of people who supported the Afghan government. Finally, IS called for the withdrawal of foreign military intervention as it stated its plan to "clear the sacred land of Khorasan of apostate hirelings of CIA, ISI and KGB intelligence networks."

Whilst certain issues were pronounced continuously through the conflict, no main conflict dynamics issue was interpreted for IS in this particular dyad as no issue was particularly emphasized in communications.

Conflict Resolution Issues: The project coded no statements from IS in Afghanistan pertaining to conflict resolution issues.

Type of conflict issues: Conflict Goal Issues: Change judicial system, CPS: Islamic state, Oust full executive, Religious rights, Restrictions on religious rights

Conflict Dynamics Issues: Call for collective targeting: political, Call for collective targeting: religious, DFI: Removal of foreign influence, DFI: Withdrawal of military intervention/foreign forces

Conflict Resolution Issues: