THREAD.

In analysing the Afghan political spectrum something becomes obvious: Kabul's base is far more diverse than the Taliban's. For simplicity's sake, I'll count stronger opposition toward the Taliban than Kabul as 'pro Kabul'.

Let's assess these generally. Exceptions apply.

A diverse base isn't necessarily, however, a good thing. Appealing to everyone ensures you appeal to no one, or that your support base is so fractured that it actually becomes a liability. Think of Clinton losing the Democrat majority in Congress being a blessing in disguise.
Some pro-Kabul groupings:

1) ethnonationalists of all ethnicities. Whilst the non-Pashtuns amongst them aren't pro-Ghani, they're pro-Kabul as an institution; they see it as far more representative and amenable to their interests than the Taliban.
Some Pashtun nationalists do support the Taliban (majority Pashtun) but these are a minority. The biggest blemishes on the Taliban's Pashtun credentials:

a) The Taliban/Pakistan relationship
b) their overt Islam, which many Pashtun nationalists are hostile toward.
2) The enlightened 'roshan-fikr' demographic

Liberals/seculars. Not much intro needed: progress, freedom, spectacular gains of the last 19 years, women's rights et cetera. You generally notice quite an anti-Islam, wholesale adoption of War on Terror rhetoric in their rationale.
3) The ex-communist

Again, not much intro needed: the Taliban are Pakistani proxies just like the Mujahideen were. Pakistan is to blame, Islam is bad/needs to be de-emphasised as it is exploited.

Noticeable that whilst distinct, they share a large overlap with groups 1) and 2).
4) The religious

Generally pro-Mujahideen who consider Kabul a legitimate Islamic authority, strongly condemn the Taliban on Islamic grounds, consider their jihad void and focus on perceived unIslamic nature of the Taliban's method of war.

Massive tension between 4) and 1/2/3.
5) The partisans

Nominally pro-Kabul but not from a moral/ideological perspective, but because their favourite politicians/warlords are currently represented in Kabul's team. Willing to cut separate deals with the Taliban as long as their party's interests are upheld.
This isn't at all a coincidence. Kabul, like other regional governments, markets itself differently based on audience. It justifies its existence on ethnic, Islamic, anti-Islamic, secular, feminist grounds and as protector of minorities simultaneously, against the daunting Talib.
Having a broad base isn't inherently a liability, but as we're in the process of negotiations we can ask of Kabul the same question that is asked of the Taliban: can it retain its unity whilst its base is comprised of elements undoubtedly hostile to one another?
4) may agree with the Taliban in making Afghanistan 'Islamic'. 2&3 would object to this. Vociferously.

Many across all groups see peace as a sham. Almost all ethnicities in 1) see their existence as mortally threatened in the event of a peace deal.

How do you reconcile these?
This thread ignores a large demographic of the Taliban base, whose fractures could appear between leadership and rank and file, but aren't as glaringly ideological.

Worth noting groups 1,2&3 comprise fringe elements, yet enjoy healthy representation, for whichever reason.
There is the massive, ignored demographic: ethnically diverse whose priority is peace, aren't fond of either side, generally indifferent as to which side 'wins'.

For them, how much worse can it get? They haven't seen 'gains' Kabul boasts of, so their preservation is unimportant.
These fault-lines will become glaringly obvious as breakthroughs are achieved in the Doha talks, especially because these factions within Kabul are well connected and represented internationally. They amplify abroad what has become tiring rhetoric and sloganeering in Afghanistan.
Anyways, I wrote something similar in my first @AfgEye article on the eve of the US-Taliban deal, critiquing whether the Taliban, in the event of peace, could maintain their movement and unity in Afghanistan.

https://t.co/JFnMO99iFP

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MISREPRESENTED CONTEXT

1. I am indeed disgusted with attempts to misrepresent and take out of context what I wrote on my blog yesterday.


2. Those who did that highlighted only one part of paragraph 12 which read: “Muslims have a right to be angry and to kill millions of French people for the massacres of the past.”

3. They stopped there and implied that I am promoting the massacre of the French.

4.If they had read d posting in its entirety & especially the subsequent sentence which read: “But by & large the Muslims hv not applied the “eye for an eye” law. Muslims don’t. The French shouldn’t. Instead the French should teach their people to respect other people’s feelings

5. Because of the spin and out of context presentation by those that picked up my posting, reports were made against me and I am accused of promoting violence etc… on Facebook and Twitter.
In 2016,Turkey arrested Abdulkadir Yapcan, a prominent Uighur political activist living in the country since 2001 and initiated his extradition. In 2017, Turkey and China signed an agreement allowing extradition even if the purported offense is only illegal in 1of the 2️⃣countries


Since early 2019, Turkey has arrested hundreds of Uighurs and sent them to deportation centers. And Erdogan’s remarks have turned diplomatically bland, just like any Uighur-related coverage in newspapers controlled by Erdogan and his supporters.

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Recently, the @CNIL issued a decision regarding the GDPR compliance of an unknown French adtech company named "Vectaury". It may seem like small fry, but the decision has potential wide-ranging impacts for Google, the IAB framework, and today's adtech. It's thread time! 👇

It's all in French, but if you're up for it you can read:
• Their blog post (lacks the most interesting details):
https://t.co/PHkDcOT1hy
• Their high-level legal decision: https://t.co/hwpiEvjodt
• The full notification: https://t.co/QQB7rfynha

I've read it so you needn't!

Vectaury was collecting geolocation data in order to create profiles (eg. people who often go to this or that type of shop) so as to power ad targeting. They operate through embedded SDKs and ad bidding, making them invisible to users.

The @CNIL notes that profiling based off of geolocation presents particular risks since it reveals people's movements and habits. As risky, the processing requires consent — this will be the heart of their assessment.

Interesting point: they justify the decision in part because of how many people COULD be targeted in this way (rather than how many have — though they note that too). Because it's on a phone, and many have phones, it is considered large-scale processing no matter what.
The entire discussion around Facebook’s disclosures of what happened in 2016 is very frustrating. No exec stopped any investigations, but there were a lot of heated discussions about what to publish and when.


In the spring and summer of 2016, as reported by the Times, activity we traced to GRU was reported to the FBI. This was the standard model of interaction companies used for nation-state attacks against likely US targeted.

In the Spring of 2017, after a deep dive into the Fake News phenomena, the security team wanted to publish an update that covered what we had learned. At this point, we didn’t have any advertising content or the big IRA cluster, but we did know about the GRU model.

This report when through dozens of edits as different equities were represented. I did not have any meetings with Sheryl on the paper, but I can’t speak to whether she was in the loop with my higher-ups.

In the end, the difficult question of attribution was settled by us pointing to the DNI report instead of saying Russia or GRU directly. In my pre-briefs with members of Congress, I made it clear that we believed this action was GRU.