Residents of Sayedabad Arabia village in Sayedabad district of Sar-e Pol Province say the Taliban demolished about 20 houses yesterday and handed their land over to Pashtun Kuchi nomads. The residents say they are of Arab descent and that the Taliban governor in Sar-e Pol has given their land to people affiliated with the Ishaqzai tribe. Video clips the residents sent to the Hasht-e Subh Daily show heavy machinery demolishing their houses and trees. According to the residents, when people protested the action, Taliban fighters opened fire on them. The residents accuse the Taliban of ethnic discrimination and say that, by destroying their homes and handing their land to others, the group is seeking ethnic cleansing and a change to the social and geographic fabric of the area.
Several residents of Sayedabad Arabia village in Sayedabad district of Sar-e Pol Province say that yesterday, at around 3 p.m., Taliban fighters entered the village in military vehicles and demolished their houses. They accuse the Taliban of ethnic discrimination and say that, while demolishing the houses, the group’s fighters treated residents in an insulting and humiliating manner, abusing and humiliating women, children, and men.
The residents claim that the Taliban handed their land over to Kuchi nomads affiliated with the Ishaqzai tribe and demolished the houses of the indigenous people. According to them, after the Taliban took control, Pashtun Ishaqzai individuals claimed that the village belonged to them. The residents add that in 2023 the Taliban forcibly displaced half of the village’s inhabitants, and that yesterday they ordered the remaining residents to vacate their homes and demolished the houses in front of their eyes.
Residents of Sayedabad Arabia village say the order to demolish and vacate their homes was issued by Qari Bakhtiar Maa’az, the Taliban governor in Sar-e Pol. According to the village residents, more than 20 Taliban fighters armed with light and heavy weapons, along with four Humvees, were stationed in the village. They then demolished the houses using heavy machinery and ordered the residents to leave the village.
The residents stress that the Arab residents of the district have faced this treatment from the Taliban because of their ethnicity and their support for the Republic. They fear that with the arrival of winter they have no shelter to live in, and they do not know how to provide shelter for themselves and their families under these conditions.
According to the residents, about 500 families have been forced to leave their villages, and the Taliban’s evacuation and demolition of people’s homes continues at full pace. They stress that a number of the families whose homes were destroyed and who were forced to leave their villages have taken refuge in the houses of relatives and friends. According to them, the Taliban also buried all the belongings and household items of these families under soil using bulldozers.
The residents say the Taliban showed no mercy even to women and children, and on the eve of winter drove them out of their homes, leaving them homeless and displaced. They say Taliban fighters told the residents: “Go wherever you want; this is not your place.”
In another report, the Hasht-e Subh Daily found that in December 2022, a number of residents of Sar-e Pol Province protested the seizure of about 6,000 jeribs of land in eight villages. Most of these residents were from the Uzbek and Tajik ethnic groups. They had said their land was seized without a fair review of ownership documents and that, in response to their protests, they were threatened with military action.
Another Hasht-e Subh Daily report also shows that the Taliban governor in Ghor, in cooperation with the group’s Ministry of Ethnic Groups and Tribes, had ordered the evacuation of about 600 families in Dolatyar district. Under this order, the indigenous residents of the area had to leave their homes immediately. In addition, they were not allowed to take their belongings, agricultural produce, or even the doors and windows of their houses with them, and they were obliged to leave the area empty-handed.
Richard Bennett, the United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Afghanistan, said in one of his reports that about 1,000 families in several villages of Daikundi Province had been forcibly evicted from their lands and homes. According to the report, a number of these families were forced to leave their homes without having sufficient opportunity to defend their property rights.
According to a UN report, in September 2021, at least 2,800 Hazara residents of 15 villages in Daikundi and Uruzgan provinces were forcibly displaced. Following an order from Taliban officials, these families were compelled to leave their homes and lands.
Amnesty International, in a report it published in July 2025, said that, amid a land dispute, the Taliban had forcibly evicted several Hazara residents of Rashak village in Panjab district of Bamyan Province from their homes. According to the report, the affected families were displaced without access to adequate shelter or compensation. The organization expressed concern over the violation of property rights and the threat to the safety and livelihoods of these families.
You can read the Persian version of this report here:
کوچ اجباری؛ طالبان خانههای باشندهگان یک روستا در سرپل را تخریب کردند
