The Shomali Plain, also called the Shomali Valley, is a plateau just north of
Kabul
Kabul (; ps, , ; , ) is the capital and largest city of Afghanistan. Located in the eastern half of the country, it is also a municipality, forming part of the Kabul Province; it is administratively divided into 22 municipal districts. Acco ...
,
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 ...
.
[ It is approximately 30 km wide and 80 km long. Once, it was a fertile area, rich with water, where fruits and vegetables were cultivated, and where Kabul's residents picknicked on weekends.][
The region was often battleground during the wars in Afghanistan since 1978.][
]
Taliban rule (1996-2001)
During the rule of the Taliban (1996-2001), fighting in the Shomali Plain was relatively sparse, but the plateau was maintained as fighting frontier by Ahmad Shah Massoud and his Northern Alliance
The Northern Alliance, officially known as the United Islamic National Front for the Salvation of Afghanistan ( prs, جبهه متحد اسلامی ملی برای نجات افغانستان ''Jabha-yi Muttahid-i Islāmi-yi Millī barāyi Nijāt ...
who challenged the Taliban
The Taliban (; ps, طالبان, ṭālibān, lit=students or 'seekers'), which also refers to itself by its state (polity), state name, the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is a Deobandi Islamic fundamentalism, Islamic fundamentalist, m ...
's control over much of Afghanistan.
When the Taliban retreated from the Plain in 1997, they poisoned wells, cut down trees, and destroyed the irrigation system of what was a largely Tajik area,[, p. 62] although there are also many Pashtuns
Pashtuns (, , ; ps, پښتانه, ), also known as Pakhtuns or Pathans, are an Iranian ethnic group who are native to the geographic region of Pashtunistan in the present-day countries of Afghanistan and Pakistan. They were historically re ...
in the area.
In 1999, the Taliban considered the region, especially towns such as Istalif
Istālif ( prs, استالف) is a village northwest of Kabul, Afghanistan, situated at an elevation of in the Shomali Plains, west of Kalakan and south-west of Bagram. It is the center of Istalif District, Kabul Province, Afghanistan. Istalif is ...
with 45,000 residents, a liability and they razed such towns, destroyed farms, and forced hundreds of thousands of people from the region.[
]
2001
In 2001, a brief battle took place on Shomali Plain between the Taliban and the Northern Alliance
The Northern Alliance, officially known as the United Islamic National Front for the Salvation of Afghanistan ( prs, جبهه متحد اسلامی ملی برای نجات افغانستان ''Jabha-yi Muttahid-i Islāmi-yi Millī barāyi Nijāt ...
. The Taliban forces, fearing encirclement, demoralized by the fall of the northern cities, and under constant American air attack, retreated to the Kabul, 45 kilometres to the north, and a day later they abandoned the city.
Rebuilding since 2002
In the 2001 Afghan War
War in Afghanistan, Afghan war, or Afghan civil war may refer to:
*Conquest of Afghanistan by Alexander the Great (330 BC – 327 BC)
*Muslim conquests of Afghanistan (637–709)
*Conquest of Afghanistan by the Mongol Empire (13th century), see als ...
, the Northern Alliance
The Northern Alliance, officially known as the United Islamic National Front for the Salvation of Afghanistan ( prs, جبهه متحد اسلامی ملی برای نجات افغانستان ''Jabha-yi Muttahid-i Islāmi-yi Millī barāyi Nijāt ...
was directed to take the Shomali Plain after it secured the supply routes from the north, and wait for an international peacekeeping force to move into Kabul
Kabul (; ps, , ; , ) is the capital and largest city of Afghanistan. Located in the eastern half of the country, it is also a municipality, forming part of the Kabul Province; it is administratively divided into 22 municipal districts. Acco ...
. They did not wait, however, because the Taliban retreated from Kabul without a fight, leaving a security vacuum, and consequently the Northern Alliance
The Northern Alliance, officially known as the United Islamic National Front for the Salvation of Afghanistan ( prs, جبهه متحد اسلامی ملی برای نجات افغانستان ''Jabha-yi Muttahid-i Islāmi-yi Millī barāyi Nijāt ...
occupied Kabul without major problems.
In the summer of 2002, the Taliban being driven from Afghanistan, villagers started to return to the Shomali Plain, starting to rebuild the agriculture and their houses.
Late 2002, the Shomali Plain still looked mostly like a desert or destructed battleground, with hardly a bush or tree, but strewn with tank-wrecks, demolished cars, torn shipping containers, and mine
Mine, mines, miners or mining may refer to:
Extraction or digging
* Miner, a person engaged in mining or digging
*Mining, extraction of mineral resources from the ground through a mine
Grammar
*Mine, a first-person English possessive pronoun
...
fields along the main road, and was considered by the UN Mine Action Center as one of the world's most active land mine
A land mine is an explosive device concealed under or on the ground and designed to destroy or disable enemy targets, ranging from combatants to vehicles and tanks, as they pass over or near it. Such a device is typically detonated automati ...
areas.[
By 2004, the ]United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is a United Nations agency mandated to aid and protect refugees, forcibly displaced communities, and stateless people, and to assist in their voluntary repatriation, local integrati ...
had put in 300 water points and resettled 14,000 families.
By 2009, the Shomali Plain had become one of the relatively few prospering areas of Afghanistan.[
The ]A76 highway
Asian Highway 76 (AH76) is a major road of northern Afghanistan. It connects Pole khomri at AH7 to Mazar-i-Sharif, passing through Samangan on the way, and then passes west and eventually ends at Herat, where it unites with AH1 and AH77
At Maza ...
, running through the Shomali Plain, is militarily necessary, had been rebuilt by 2009 and was being secured, which urgency and security did not exist elsewhere in the country.
That A76 runs from Kabul to Bagram
Bagram (; Pashto/ fa, بگرام) is a town and seat in Bagram District in Parwan Province of Afghanistan, about 60 kilometers north of the capital Kabul. It is the site of an ancient city located at the junction of the Ghorband and Panjshir Va ...
and Charikar
Imam Abu Hanifa ( fa, امام ابو حنیفه), historically known as Charikar (Persian: چاریکار) but renamed by Talibans recently to Imam Abu Hanifa, is the main town of the Koh Daman Valley and the capital of Parwan Province in norther ...
in Parwan Province
Parwan (Dari: ), also spelled Parvan, is one of the 34 provinces of Afghanistan. It has a population of about 751,000. The province is multi-ethnic and mostly rural society. The province is divided into ten districts. The town of Imam Abu Hanif ...
, and then into the Hindu Kush mountains
The Hindu Kush is an mountain range in Central and South Asia to the west of the Himalayas. It stretches from central and western Afghanistan, Quote: "The Hindu Kush mountains run along the Afghan border with the North-West Frontier Provinc ...
to the Salang Tunnel
The Salang Tunnel ( prs, تونل سالنگ ''Tūnel-e Sālang'', ps, د سالنگ تونل ''Da Sālang Tūnel'') is a tunnel in Afghanistan, located at the Salang Pass in the Hindu Kush mountains, between the Parwan Province, Parwan and B ...
. The tunnel provides the only year-round, all-weather access to the north of Afghanistan.
References
{{Coord, 34, 51, 32, N, 69, 14, 2, E, display=title
Landforms of Afghanistan
Plateaus of Asia