The Taliban have banned the video-sharing app TikTok in Afghanistan, insisting they are misleading Afghan youth. The popular mobile game Player Unknown’s Battlegrounds (PUBG) was also banned.
Since returning to power in August last year, the Taliban have already banned music, films, and soap operas. phone apps are popular with Afghans who have run out of entertainment options.
In a statement Thursday, the cabinet said the apps had “distracted the younger generation,” adding that the Telecoms Department had been ordered to shut them down.
Since the Taliban took over Afghanistan last year, according to the results of a Gallur poll in February. This was not only a record for Afghanistan but also the highest level of suffering Gallup has measured for a country since 2005.
Gallup ranks people as “affluent,” “struggling,” or “suffering” based on how they assess their own values in current and future lives on a scale of zero to ten.
It also ordered the ministry to stop broadcasting “immoral material” on TV channels, although according to the report, only religious news and programs are broadcast.
Almost all Afghans (94 percent) rate their lives so poorly that they have suffered since the Taliban took over Afghanistan last year, according to a February Gallup poll.
That was not only a record for Afghanistan but also the highest level of suffering Gallup has measured for a country since 2005. Gallup ranks people as “thriving,” “struggling,” or “suffering” based on their current rating, and future lives on a scale of zero to ten.
Just over nine million people have Internet access in Afghanistan, a country of about 38 million people, according to figures released in January by DataReportal, an independent data collector. There are about four million social network users, with Facebook being the most popular.