RASC News Agency: Atta Mohammad Noor, a prominent political leader and head of the Noor faction of the Jamiat-e Islami party, has issued a strongly worded denunciation of the Taliban’s extractive practices in northeastern Afghanistan, accusing the group of looting the country’s mineral wealth and implementing ethnically targeted policies under the guise of governance. In a statement released on Thursday, Noor declared that any contracts or agreements related to mining and natural resource extraction signed under Taliban rule lack all legal legitimacy. He described such dealings as blatant acts of national betrayal, asserting that they represent a wholesale plunder of the Afghanistani people’s shared inheritance.
“These so-called agreements, entered into without the mandate of a legitimate and inclusive government, are not worth the paper they’re written on,” Noor stated. “They are tools of economic colonization an assault on public assets disguised as development.” He accused the Taliban of operating outside all ethical, legal, and religious bounds since their return to power, imposing what he termed a reign of tyranny defined by systemic violence, repression, and disregard for Islamic teachings. “Their actions have plunged Afghanistan into a dangerous spiral of darkness, isolation, and political regression,” Noor added.
Noor’s most damning criticism centers on the Taliban’s aggressive and secretive exploitation of the country’s mineral wealth, particularly in the resource-rich and ethnically diverse provinces of Badakhshan and Takhar. He pointed to the strategic deployment of extraction companies from Taliban strongholds in the south into these northern provinces as a clear indication of what he calls a policy of “national oppression and demographic transformation.” “This is not merely about resource extraction,” he emphasized. “It is part of a broader agenda to alter the ethnic fabric of historically non-Pashtun regions, consolidating Taliban control through economic coercion and forced displacement.”
He warned that the systematic plunder of these regions could lead to the marginalization of local communities, the erosion of cultural identity, and the ignition of long-term instability. Noor also highlighted growing evidence that the Taliban are working with unregulated local militias and armed groups to carry out unauthorized mining operations coperations that are enriching Taliban affiliates while leaving behind environmental devastation and social unrest. Reports from local sources indicate widespread ecological degradation due to haphazard excavation. Natural water channels have been disrupted, causing unexpected flood patterns, soil erosion, and irreversible harm to the local environment. “This destruction is not just economic it is environmental and cultural vandalism,” Noor said.
He called upon the United Nations, international human rights organizations, and the global diplomatic community to take urgent action. He urged these entities to halt what he described as the Taliban’s illegal and illegitimate exploitation of Afghanistan’s national assets and to prevent further attempts at ethnic reengineering in the country’s northeast. “If these actions continue unchecked,” Noor warned, “the resulting crisis will be catastrophic. The northeast will not be the only region affected. The consequences of such greed, ethnic manipulation, and ecological destruction will reverberate across the entire country perhaps even beyond its borders.”
This statement marks one of the most severe indictments yet by a leading political figure against the Taliban’s opaque economic and territorial strategies. As Afghanistan remains isolated and its economy hollowed out, critics say the Taliban are treating the country’s natural resources as spoils of war, auctioning them off to maintain power while excluding the majority of Afghanistan’s population especially its ethnically marginalized communities from any share in governance, representation, or economic opportunity.
