Panjshir (Dari: پنجشیر, literally "Five Lions," pronounced /pand͡ʒʃeːɾ/, also spelled as Panjsher) is one of the thirty-four provinces of Afghanistan, located in the northeastern part of the country containing the Panjshir Valley. The province is divided into seven districts and contains 512 villages. As of 2021, the population of Panjshir province was about 173,000.
Panjshir was attacked multiple times during the 1980s Soviet–Afghan War, against Ahmad Shah Massoud and his forces. The Panjshir region was in rebel control from August 17, 1979, after a regional uprising.[6] Aided by its mountainous terrain,[7] the region was well defended by mujahedeen commanders during the war against the PDPA government and the Soviet Union.
After the collapse of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan in 1992, the area became part of the Islamic State of Afghanistan. By the late 1990s, Panjshir and neighboring Badakhshan province served as a staging ground for the Northern Alliance against the Taliban. On September 9, 2001, Defense Minister Ahmad Shah Massoud was assassinated by two al-Qaeda operatives.[8] Two days later the September 2001 attacks occurred in the United States and this led to the start of a major U.S.-led war in Afghanistan.
Construction of the Panjshir football stadium, 2011
Following the Fall of Kabul on 15 August 2021, anti-Taliban forces loyal to the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan fled to the Panjshir Province.[9] They formed the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan and kept fighting the new Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan in an ongoing conflict. The new resistance forces flew the old flag of the Northern Alliance.[10] The resistance has held the Panjshir Valley and captured districts in neighboring provinces.[11] By early September 2021, Taliban forces managed to push into Panjshir and capture several districts from the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan,[12] before gaining control of Bazarak on 6 September, pushing remaining resistance fighters into the mountains.[13][14][15] However, clashes still remain ongoing between the Taliban and resistance fighters in Panjshir Province.[16][17] A subsequent visit by Radio Télévision Suisse and Journeyman Pictures into Bazarak in October 2021 also revealed that despite claims of NRF inactivity by local Taliban officials, an armed confrontation between the NRF Taliban was in fact occurring in an undisclosed location in the mountains surrounding Bazarak, with resistance forces gaining the upper hand, thus confirming that the NRF remains still active near Bazarak and in Panjshir Province.[18] Although the NRF continues to carry out attacks, it does not control any territory in the province.[19]
The overall literacy rate (6+ years of age) fell from 33% in 2005 to 32% in 2011.[20]
The overall net enrolment rate (6–13 years of age) fell from 42% in 2005 to 40% in 2011.[20]
Four Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) schools service the agriculturally-oriented Panjshir Province, including the Ahmad Shah Massoud TVET. The school was established with the help from the Hilfe Paderborn and German Foreign Office and as of 2014 had about 250 students and 22 staff members.[citation needed]
^Note: "Predominantely" or "dominated" is interpreted as 99%, "majority" as 70%, "mixed" as 1/(number of ethnicities), "minority" as 30% and "few" or "some" as 1%.
^Bowersox, Gary W. (2004). The Gem Hunter: The Adventures of an American in Afghanistan. United States: GeoVision, Inc. p. 100. ISBN0-9747-3231-1. Archived from the original on 8 August 2021. Retrieved 22 August 2010. To launch this plan, Bhutto recruited and trained a group of Afghans in the Bala-Hesar of Peshawar, in Pakistan's North-west Frontier Province. Among these young men were Massoud, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, and other members of Jawanan-e Musulman. It served Massoud's interests, which were apparently opposition to the Soviets. Later, after Massoud and Hekmatyar had a terrible falling-out over Massoud's opposition to terrorist tactics and methods, Massoud overthrew from Jawanan-e Musulman. He joined Rabani's newly created Afghan political party, Jamiat-i-Islami, in exile in Pakistan.
^"Operations". Northern Alliance: Fighting for a Free Afghanistan. Friends of the Northern Alliance. Archived from the original on 24 August 2021. Retrieved 20 August 2021.
