April 30, 2024 Quarterly Report to Congress

However, the Taliban have not made any efforts to improve inclusivity or human rights during the reporting period.40 Afghanistan Ranked Unhappiest Country in the World Researchers at the University of Oxford Wellbeing Research Centre say Afghanistan has become the unhappiest country in the world, across all cat- egories, since the Taliban took over in 2021, according to the latest edition of the W. [...] The Akhundzada defended the Taliban’s interpretation Taliban leader said the international community’s of sharia law and addressed international critics advocacy for women’s rights conflicted with the of the group’s human rights record: “Our mission Taliban’s version of sharia and questioned whether is to enforce sharia and Allah’s Hudud [law]… You Afghan women want the rights the West extolls. [...] “Afghanistan under the Taliban should be understood as a kleptocracy, where a mafia-like group has captured the state and rule at the expense of the people,” according to the Captured State: Corruption and Kleptocracy in Afghanistan Under the Taliban report. [...] The report docu- mented that the Taliban are leveraging their capture of the Afghan state “to loot the wealth of the country for their own private gain.”255 Taliban rule is often described as “hell on earth,” according to the second report in their series that focused on the human toll of the Taliban’s fear- based kleptocracy. [...] The report quoted one landowner saying, “With the banning of opium, the price went up to the sky: my life is better with the order of Shaikh Sahib.” The report emphasized that “the issue of inventory is critical when it comes to understanding the current Taliban drug ban and its effects.” The ban ultimately benefits those with stockpiles of opium and landed farm- ers, who were in a better position.