Afghanistan Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bordere ...

is divided into 34

province A province is almost always an administrative division within a country or state. The term derives from the ancient Roman '' provincia'', which was the major territorial and administrative unit of the Roman Empire's territorial possessions ou ...

s (, '' wilåyat''). The provinces of Afghanistan are the primary

administrative division Administrative division, administrative unit,Article 3(1). country subdivision, administrative region, subnational entity, constituent state, as well as many similar terms, are generic names for geographical areas into which a particular, ind ...

s. Each province encompasses a number of districts or usually over 1,000 villages. Provincial governors played a critical role in the reconstruction of the Afghan state following the creation of the new government under

Hamid Karzai Hamid Karzai (; Pashto/ fa, حامد کرزی, , ; born 24 December 1957) is an Afghan statesman who served as the fourth president of Afghanistan from July 2002 to September 2014, including as the first elected president of the Islamic Repub ...

. According to international security scholar Dipali Mukhopadhyay, many of the provincial governors of the western-backed government were former

warlord A warlord is a person who exercises military, economic, and political control over a region in a country without a strong national government; largely because of coercive control over the armed forces. Warlords have existed throughout much of h ...

s who were incorporated into the political system.

Provinces of Afghanistan

Regions of Afghanistan

UN Regions

Former provinces of Afghanistan

During Afghanistan's history it had a number of provinces in it. It started out as just Kabul, Herat, Qandahar, and Balkh but the number of provinces increased and by 1880 the provinces consisted of Balkh, Herat, Qandahar, Ghazni, Jalalabad, and Kabul. * Southern Province – dissolved in 1964 to create

Paktia Province Paktia (Pashto/Dari: – ''Paktyā'') is one of the 34 provinces of Afghanistan, located in the east of the country. Forming part of the larger Loya Paktia region, Paktia Province is divided into 15 districts and has a population of roughly ...

. *

Turkestan Province Turkestan Province ( prs, ولایت ترکستان) was a province in Afghanistan. It was located in northern Afghanistan in the region still known as Afghan Turkestan. In 1890, Qataghan-Badakhshan Province was separated from Turkestan Provin ...

– dissolved somewhere between 1929 and 1946. * Qataghan-Badakhshan Province – dissolved in 1963 into

Badakhshan Province Badakhshan Province (Persian/ Uzbek: , ''Badaxšān'') is one of the 34 provinces of Afghanistan, located in the northeastern part of the country. It is bordered by Tajikistan's Gorno-Badakhshan in the north and the Pakistani regions of Lower ...

and

Qataghan Province Qataghan Province ( Persian/Pashto: قطغن), was a province of Afghanistan which became defunct in 1963, when it was divided into the current Baghlan Province, Kunduz Province, and Takhar Province.Ludwig W. Adamec. Historical and political gaze ...

, the latter of which was also dissolved that same year. *

– dissolved in 1963 into Baghlan Province, Kunduz Province, and

Takhar Province Takhar (Dari , Farsi/Pashto: ) is one of the thirty-four provinces of Afghanistan, located in the northeast of the country next to Tajikistan. It is surrounded by Badakhshan in the east, Panjshir in the south, and Baghlan and Kunduz in the w ...

. * Eastern Province – dissolved in 1964 to create Nangarhar Province. *

Farah-Chakansur Province Farah-Chakansur Province is a defunct province of Afghanistan. In 1863, Sher Ali Khan formed the province of Farah and separated it from Herat and Kandahar. Formerly Farah had been subject to Herat, but instead he made it a separate province and g ...

– dissolved in 1964 into

Farah Province Farah (Dari: , ''Farā'') is one of the 34 provinces of Afghanistan, located in the southwestern part of the country next to Iran. It is a spacious and sparsely populated province, divided into eleven districts and contains hundreds of villages. ...

and

Nimruz Province Nimruz or Nimroz (Dari: ; Balochi: ) is one of the 34 provinces of Afghanistan, located in the southwestern part of the country. It lies to the east of the Sistan and Baluchestan Province of Iran and north of Balochistan, Pakistan, also borde ...

. * Mazar-i-Sharif Province – dissolved in 1964 into

Balkh Province Balkh (Dari: , ''Balx'') is one of the 34 provinces of Afghanistan, located in the north of the country. It is divided into 15 districts and has a population of about 1,509,183, which is multi-ethnic and mostly a Persian-speaking society. The c ...

and

Jowzjan Province Jowzjan, sometimes spelled Jawzjan or Jozjan (Dari: ), is one of the thirty-four provinces of Afghanistan, located in the north of the country bordering neighboring Turkmenistan. The province is divided into 11 districts and contains hundreds of v ...

. *

Meymaneh Province Meymaneh Province was a former province of Afghanistan, which in 1964 was divided, creating Badghis Province Bādghīs (Dari: ) is one of the thirty-four provinces of Afghanistan, located in the northwest of the country, on the border with Turkme ...

– dissolved in 1964 into Badghis Province and

Faryab Province Faryab (Dari: ) is one of the thirty-four provinces of Afghanistan, which is located in the north of the country bordering neighboring Turkmenistan. It has a population of about 1,109,223, which is multi-ethnic and mostly a tribal society. The pr ...

Notes

References

External links

Afghanistan Information Management Services (AIMS)

Afghanistan Provinces MapXavier de Planhol, 2000, ''GEOGRAPHY i. Evolution of geographical knowledge: Development of geographical knowledge about Afghanistan.'', Encyclopædia Iranica.
{{Articles on first-level administrative divisions of Asian countries Subdivisions of Afghanistan Provinces, Afghanistan Afghanistan 1 Subdivisions of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan