People are probably tired of seeing me tweet that the TAPI pipeline, intended to deliver natural gas from Turkmenistan to India via Afghanistan, is never going to be built.

The BBC has a good article today giving one reason why it probably won't happen.

Thread. This is a survey of China's recent progress in building ultra-high-voltage transmission lines, which can carry power across long distances with very little loss from electrical resistance:



China faces a problem much like that of South and Central Asia.bbc.com/future/article…

Donald Trump claimed in 2019 that the US had killed Osama bin Laden's son, Hamza bin Laden. But there have been persistent rumors that he's hiding out in Afghanistan.

Those rumors went mainstream over the weekend. And I think I know what caused them to break through.

Thread. There's been social media chatter on this topic for a few months, mostly among people who didn't seem too credible.

But you can't miss it now if you're on Afghan Twitter—or following the mainstream media in India, where it's turned into a major story.

So where did it come from?

Afghanistan has one of the world's highest rates of childhood lead exposure, which causes permanent brain damage.

Nearly all children here have significant lead poisoning.

Researchers in the US have found the source of the lead. But nobody has told the Afghan public.

Thread.
A worldwide survey in 2020 found that one in three children had blood lead above 5 micrograms per deciliter (μg/dL). That's considered the threshold for lead poisoning.

Children in Afghanistan have an 𝘢𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘢𝘨𝘦 blood lead level of 14.2 μg/dL, nearly three times the cutoff.

Afghanistan has one of the world's highest rates of childhood lead exposure, which causes permanent brain damage.

افغانستان در جهان دارای یکی از بلندترین سطوح مواجهت اطفال با سرب است، که این امر باعث آسیب دایمی مغزی میشود. Nearly all children here have significant lead poisoning.

تقریبا تمام اطفال افغانستان مواجه با مسمومیت جدی سربی هستند.

I said the other day that nobody knows whether kohl in Afghanistan is contaminated with lead. That was wrong.

Thread.

Lead in Afghan kohl (𝘬𝘢𝘫𝘢𝘭 or 𝘴𝘶𝘳𝘮𝘢) was confirmed in 2013 by public health officials in the US.

Two Afghan immigrant children, siblings aged 20 months and 4 months, were diagnosed with high blood lead: 27.0 µg/dL in the older child and 33.5 µg/dL in the younger one.

Afghanistan has one of the world's highest rates of childhood lead exposure, which causes permanent brain damage.

Nearly all children here have significant lead poisoning.

Researchers in the US have found the source of the lead. But nobody has told the Afghan public.

Thread.

A worldwide survey in 2020 found that one in three children had blood lead above 5 micrograms per deciliter (μg/dL). That's considered the threshold for lead poisoning.

Children in Afghanistan have an 𝘢𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘢𝘨𝘦 blood lead level of 14.2 μg/dL, nearly three times the cutoff.

I said I'd write something about SIGAR's new report on cash shipments to Afghanistan, which you can read here:



But I've been hesitating, because people who should understand this subject better than me seem to be getting it wrong.

So here goes.

Thread. sigar.mil/pdf/evaluation…
What's especially odd is that SIGAR published another report on this topic in January, which at least showed a grasp of the basic concepts involved:



But the new report is fundamentally confused. And the confusion seems to originate from the World Bank.

https://x.com/JeffRigsby2/status/1789664365664419859

I've been down with some kind of virus but I did promise Obaidullah Baheer I'd write a thread about US aid to Afghanistan.

The claim that the US gives the Taliban "$40 million per week" popped up again a few days ago, I think because of some recent Shawn Ryan podcasts.

Thread. The main people involved in spreading these allegations are all sniping at each other just now, but the mysterious "CIA tracker" Sarah Adams does make an important point that's often obscured.

There are two distinct claims being made about US financial support for the Taliban.

School of Leadership-Afghanistan has just done something unusual with its accounting.

They've changed their year-end from December to June, which required them to submit a one-off IRS filing for the first six months of 2023.

Their new Form 990 deserves a closer look.

Thread.

SOLA has also made changes to its "governing documents", which I don't think are publicly available.

There's nothing wrong with a charity's changing its fiscal year, of course. In fact it's nice to see the school's mandatory financial disclosures coming earlier than expected.

Melinda French Gates is apparently still doing this. She's decided that Shabana Basij-Rasikh is among the "philanthropic leaders" who deserve a $20 million unrestricted grant.

Thread.

https://twitter.com/melindagates/status/1813950276342059446

What's baffling about this is not just French Gates's choice of recipients—although Basij-Rasikh isn't the only one with a dubious track record—but the underlying logic of the gifts.

If she thinks certain projects or organizations are deserving, she can donate to them directly.

Melinda French Gates plans to give $20 million to each of twelve "thought leaders" in women's philanthropy.

I mustn't link to her op-ed in the 𝘕𝘦𝘸 𝘈𝘮𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘥𝘢𝘮 𝘛𝘪𝘮𝘦𝘴 so here's an excerpt, along with the list of beneficiaries.

Do you see a problem here?

Thread.

I don't know who most of these people are. But I do know something about Shabana Basij-Rasikh, the founder of School of Leadership-Afghanistan (SOLA).

She inspired my most popular tweetstorm:

I didn't expect there'd be any need to return to this topic.

https://x.com/JeffRigsby2/status/1631331691964022787

For the second Abbey Gate investigation, CENTCOM interviewed a number of Marines and soldiers who hadn't been contacted the first time around.

It's usually not possible to identify the interview subjects, whose names are redacted.

But for Tyler Vargas-Andrews, it is.

Thread. It was Vargas-Andrews's testimony in March 2023 before the House Foreign Affairs Committee, at which he said he'd spotted the ISKP bomber on the morning of the attack and been denied permission to engage, that led to the second inquiry.

But he'd already spoken out elsewhere.

After my back-and-forth with Scott Richards last week, I realized there were things I didn't understand about the UN's shipments of dollars to Kabul.

But since no one else seems to understand either, I've tried to walk myself through this issue.

Thread.

https://twitter.com/skotrds/status/1786396958208184587

It's become a standard talking point that the UN ships $40 million to Afghanistan each week. But that claim is misleading in several ways.

For one thing, people don't always understand that this isn't "extra" money over and above the official aid figures.

It just 𝘪𝘴 the aid.

After my back-and-forth with Scott Richards last week, I realized there were things I didn't understand about the UN's shipments of dollars to Kabul.

But since no one else seems to understand either, I've tried to walk myself through this issue.

Thread.

https://twitter.com/skotrds/status/1786396958208184587

It's become a standard talking point that the UN ships $40 million to Afghanistan each week. But that claim is misleading in several ways.

For one thing, people don't always understand that this isn't "extra" money over and above the official aid figures.

It just 𝘪𝘴 the aid.

I don't usually tag people in tweets. It seems self-important, like tapping someone on the shoulder when you want to join the conversation at a party. But for this thread I will.

Congress has some questions for the Defense Department, and I think I may be able to help.

Thread. None of the eight Republicans who signed the letter to Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has put a press release up on his website.

And CNN didn't release the text of the letter, which makes you wonder if they're worried about an electronic watermark that could identify its source.

The US election will probably be very close. I don't think it's 𝘭𝘪𝘬𝘦𝘭𝘺 that Trump will win, but it's possible.

(He's been ahead of Biden in the polls for a while. Many people expect that to change soon, but it's already March and the numbers haven't really moved.)

Thread. People who still remember Afghanistan are already making contingency plans for that outcome.

Albert Torres, of the George W. Bush Institute, published a set of proposals in 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘏𝘪𝘭𝘭 on Sunday that probably won't get a hearing from President Biden.

thehill.com/opinion/450529…

The other day I wrote about Muhammadiyah's recent proposal to open girls' schools in Afghanistan.

I should have read their website more carefully. The group's work here—which has US government backing—has flown under the radar for over a year.

[link removed; see below]

Thread. Rina Amiri visited the organization's Jakarta headquarters on 26 August 2022 to discuss educational options for Afghan women and girls. One idea at that point was that they might study at Muhammadiyah schools overseas.

The meeting wasn't secret, but it wasn't well publicized.

I wrote almost two months ago about a serious legal error that seems to have been made by the directors of the Afghan Fund:



I haven't seen any sign that the issue has been resolved yet, so I think I should explain my concerns in more detail.

Thread.

https://twitter.com/JeffRigsby2/status/1677283983955210241

I realize the people involved aren't free to talk about this—two of them have told me as much—and that's fine.

But I want to make sure the problem is understood, and Twitter is my only platform for publicizing it.

(Although I intend to write something in a longer format soon.)

More cryptic news about Chinese investment in Afghanistan:



This time the potential investor is "Fan China Afghan Mining Processing and Trading", a company I don't think anyone has ever heard of before.

But in fact, this all looks very familiar.

Thread.khaama.com/chinese-mining… Khaama says FAMPTC is "a partnership between Afghanistan’s Watan Group and China’s Xinjiang Central Asia Petroleum and Gas Co (CAPEIC)".

Remember CAPEIC?

They announced back in January that they were taking a lease on the Amu Darya oilfield in Jowzjan and Sar-e Pul provinces.

Strange things are happening at the Fund for the Afghan People.

I don't think it's anything very sinister, but it confirms my suspicion that the US government is making a mess of the Fund's legal technicalities.

Thread. If you open you'll see three new items.

They've issued a revision to the Fund's charter (𝘚𝘵𝘢𝘵𝘶𝘵𝘴) and a "Statement", both dated 23 June. It seems a third Board meeting was held that day.

They've also posted the minutes of the second Board meeting.afghanfund.ch

I was going to save these until someone answered an email I sent, but I think I'll put them out now.

The Iranian government seems to be trying to deescalate. Two hours ago the interior ministry said the "brief conflict" with the IEA was over:

iranintl.com/202305293266

Thread. But both sides need to look at reconnaissance data the United States collected in 2021 and 2022.

The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (nga.mil), which specializes in mapping and satellite photography, operates a website where it posts open-source research.