Taliban Crackdown on Shia Institutions in Kabul Raises Alarm Among Shia Muslims in the United States

A widening Taliban crackdown on prominent Shia religious institutions, scholars and community leaders in Afghanistan is raising serious concern among Shia Muslims in the United States, following the forced evacuation of one of Kabul’s leading Shia seminaries and a series of reported detentions.

Taliban forces surrounded the Khatam al Nabiyyin Seminary in Kabul on September 5, ordering officials, teachers and students to evacuate the complex. Afghanistan International reported that members of Kabul’s Shia community gathered outside in protest as Taliban personnel and military vehicles surrounded the institution. Source: Afghanistan International.

The confrontation was followed by widespread detentions. Mohammad Jawad Mohseni, head of the Khatam al Nabiyyin complex, said 28 instructors and students were detained. Four were subsequently released, leaving 24 reportedly in custody at the time of his statement. Source: Amu TV.

Two days later, the confrontation escalated.

On September 7, Taliban forces forcibly removed students from the seminary and took control of the premises. KabulNow reported that students were ordered to leave with their belongings and that Taliban forces had effectively taken control of the religious school. Source: KabulNow.

The crackdown has not stopped at the seminary.

Afghanistan International reported that Taliban forces subsequently detained members of the Hazara and Shia Elders’ Public Relations Office after scholars and community representatives gathered in Kabul to discuss the crisis at Khatam al Nabiyyin. Those reportedly detained included Sayed Sufi Gardizi, Sayed Hassan Sharif Balkhabi and Hussain Sangardost, along with other people who were present at the meeting. Source: Afghanistan International.

According to KabulNow, the meeting itself was intended to discuss efforts to secure the release of the detained teachers and students and pursue discussions with Taliban authorities. Source: KabulNow.

That fact makes the arrests especially disturbing. Shia community representatives were reportedly detained while attempting to respond peacefully to the detention of other members of their community.

Then, on September 8, Taliban forces surrounded the Kabul office of Afghanistan’s High Shia Council. The reason for that action was not immediately clear. Source: KabulNow.

Taken together, these incidents raise a far more troubling possibility: what Taliban authorities have presented as a dispute involving one institution may be developing into a broader campaign of pressure against organized Shia religious and community life in Afghanistan.

A Property Dispute Cannot Explain What Is Happening

Taliban authorities have claimed that the Khatam al Nabiyyin complex was constructed on government owned land and should come under state control.

Officials representing the seminary strongly dispute that claim. They say they possess legal documentation supporting private ownership and maintain that the property dispute remained before a court without a final judgment when the Taliban ordered the evacuation. Source: KabulNow.

The Taliban has also alleged political connections involving institutions associated with the complex. Mohammad Jawad Mohseni has rejected those allegations and characterized the actions against the institution as politically and religiously motivated. Source: Amu TV.

Whatever the merits of a property dispute, the events now extend far beyond a disagreement over ownership.

Armed personnel surrounding a religious seminary is not an ordinary property proceeding. Detaining teachers and students is not an ordinary property proceeding. Arresting Shia community figures reportedly meeting to discuss the release of those detainees is not an ordinary property proceeding.

And surrounding additional Shia organizations makes it increasingly difficult to view these events in isolation.

An Institution at the Center of Afghan Shia Life

Khatam al Nabiyyin is not an obscure religious school. The institution was established in 2007 by Grand Ayatollah Mohammad Asif Mohseni, one of Afghanistan’s most prominent Shia scholars. It developed into a major center for Shia religious education, scholarship and community activity in Kabul.

The wider network associated with Mohseni has included Khatam al Nabiyyin University and Tamadon TV, one of Afghanistan’s most prominent Shia oriented religious and cultural broadcasters.

Tamadon TV has itself faced Taliban restrictions. The broadcaster’s operations were halted by Taliban authorities before the current confrontation at the seminary, part of a pattern that now takes on greater significance in light of the September actions.

The cumulative picture is difficult to ignore: a Shia television network silenced, a major Shia seminary forcibly emptied, teachers and students detained, Shia elders arrested and additional Shia institutions surrounded.

The Detention of Sheikh Mohammad Hassan Mohseni

The situation became still more concerning with reports concerning Sheikh Mohammad Hassan Mohseni, the eldest son and successor of Grand Ayatollah Mohammad Asif Mohseni.

Afghan media reported that Mohseni was detained near his home in Kabul following the evacuation of Khatam al Nabiyyin and taken to an undisclosed location. As of September 10, no credible public reporting located by the Shia Muslim Foundation has established that Mohseni has been released or publicly confirmed his present location and condition.

That uncertainty should command immediate international attention. When authorities take a prominent religious scholar into custody, the minimum expectation is that his family and the public know where he is being held, the legal basis for his detention and his physical condition.

Why Shia Muslims in America Are Alarmed

For Shia Muslims in the United States, these developments cannot be dismissed as a distant administrative dispute.

Afghanistan’s Shia population has endured generations of sectarian violence, discrimination and attacks. Mosques, seminaries, schools, media organizations and community institutions provide the structure through which a minority community can educate its children, train its scholars and preserve its religious traditions.

Pressure on those institutions therefore affects far more than buildings.

When a government can forcibly empty a major Shia seminary, detain its teachers and students, take a prominent scholar to an undisclosed location and arrest community representatives reportedly attempting to discuss those detentions, the issue becomes one of religious freedom and basic human rights.

Shia organizations inside Afghanistan are already sounding the alarm. Shia councils in Kandahar have called for the release of detained Shia elders and urged Taliban authorities to treat citizens without discrimination based on ethnicity, religion or language. Source: Hasht e Subh Daily.

Those concerns should not remain confined to Afghanistan.

The Shia Muslim Foundation believes the developments demand immediate attention from the United States government, the United Nations, international human rights organizations, religious freedom bodies and elected officials.

Taliban authorities should immediately disclose the whereabouts and condition of Sheikh Mohammad Hassan Mohseni and every scholar, teacher, student and community representative detained in connection with these events.

They should explain the legal basis for each detention and permit access to families and appropriate legal safeguards. Anyone detained solely for peaceful religious, educational or community activity should be released.

There must also be international scrutiny of the seizure of Khatam al Nabiyyin and the expanding actions against other Shia organizations.

For American Shia Muslims, what is at stake is much larger than one seminary or one scholar. It is the ability of an already vulnerable religious minority to maintain its institutions, educate its scholars, organize peacefully and practice its faith without intimidation.