The largest humanitarian crisis in the world

On August 30, 2021, the United States and its allies withdrew their military forces from Afghanistan, bringing a sudden and dramatic end to 19 years and ten months of war, occupation and insurgency.

The Taliban, a Deobandi-Pashtun Islamic fundamentalist movement, which had ruled much of the country during the 1990s, quickly retook power. In the days, weeks and months that followed, more than a million Afghanistani civilians became refugees or were internally displaced.

According to the International Crisis Group, “Afghanistan is now the world’s largest humanitarian crisis” wherein “Tens of millions of lives are at stake.”

This page brings together all of CIPS’ ongoing coverage of the crisis. More recent events and blogs are closer to the top.