Afghanistan Crisis

Afghanistan Map
Source: OCHA/ReliefWeb

The country

Afghanistan is a landlocked country in Southern Asia, bordering Iran, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, China, and Pakistan. Its national capital is Kabul.  Afghanistan covers a land area of 652,230 square kilometers. As of 2025, the country has an estimated population of around 45 million people.

The humanitarian situation

Three and a half years after the fall of Kabul, Afghanistan remains in the grip of one of the world's worst humanitarian crises. Millions of people in Afghanistan are experiencing misery and hunger in the midst of decades of conflict. The cumulative effects of violent conflict, internal displacement, drought and other natural disasters have dramatically increased humanitarian needs throughout Afghanistan. The country is vulnerable to natural disasters, including floods and earthquakes.

The collapse of the country's economy further exacerbates humanitarian needs. Unemployment has doubled. And 48 percent of Afghans live below the poverty line. The World Bank reported in April 2024 that the aftermath of the Taliban takeover had seen a sharp decline in international aid, leaving Afghanistan without internal growth engines and leading to "a staggering 26 percent contraction in real GDP."

Millions of Afghans  - especially children and women - continue to struggle in one of the world's largest, most neglected and complex humanitarian crises. The United Nations estimates that 22.9 million people - including 12.3 million children - will need humanitarian assistance and protection in 2025. Ongoing insecurity and frequent natural disasters continue to displace populations and create additional humanitarian needs across the country.

In October 2023, a series of powerful earthquakes shook the western part of the country, killing nearly 1,500 people. In June 2022, a devastating earthquake struck Afghanistan, killing at least 1,000 people and injuring many more.

In May 2024, northern Afghanistan experienced unprecedented rainfall, causing severe flooding that destroyed or damaged more than 9,000 homes. The disaster claimed the lives of more than 450 people and injured at least 1,700, with several others still missing and many left homeless. In mid-April, heavy rains and flash floods in 32 of Afghanistan's 34 provinces killed more than 100 people and destroyed nearly 1,000 homes. 

More than 700,000 people were forced to flee their homes in 2021 alone, and more than 500,000 were newly displaced in 2022. Since 2021, approximately 1.6 million people have sought refuge in neighboring countries. As of August 2024, more than 6.3 million people remain displaced within the country, while 5.5 million Afghans had fled the South Asian country and were registered as refugees in six of the neighboring countries. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) predicted that more than 900,000 people would be newly displaced in 2024.

The Regional Refugee Response Plan for the Afghanistan Situation 2025 will seek 624.5 million US Dollar to support 7.3 million people, including 4.8 million Afghans as well as 2.5 million of their local hosts across the region. The five neighboring countries Iran, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan host more than 8 million Afghans, including 5.5 million registered refugees and asylum-seekers. According to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), many Afghans have been in the region for decades, mostly in the Islamic Republics of Iran and Pakistan. 

At the beginning of October 2023, the Pakistani government announced plans to repatriate "illegal foreigners". Since then, hundred of thousands Afghan nationals from neighboring Pakistan have returned to their home country as they were threatened with deportation. The returnees to Afghanistan are contributing to the deepening humanitarian crisis. In September 2024, Iran announced its intention to repatriate up to two million Afghans by March 2025.

Large numbers of Afghan returnees are in need of protection, including many women and children. The Pakistani government has ignored global calls to halt the deportation of Afghan refugees. From January to early December 2024, some 1.2 million undocumented Afghan returnees have returned to Afghanistan, with more than 1.1 million coming from Iran and 80,000 from Pakistan.

Nearly one-third of Afghans continue to suffer from hunger. According to the most recent IPC food security analysis, more than 14.8 million people in Afghanistan are acutely food insecure through March 2025, including 3.1 million people at emergency levels of food insecurity. 

About 3.5 million children under five are suffering or projected to suffer from acute malnutrition and require urgent assistance. This includes approximately 867,000 cases of severe acute malnutrition (SAM) and nearly 2.6 million cases of moderate acute malnutrition (MAM). In addition, 1.2 million pregnant and breastfeeding women are estimated to suffer from acute malnutrition.

Aid operations in the country currently face a critical funding gap as humanitarian needs remain severe. According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), severe underfunding led to a massive reduction in the number of people targeted for food assistance each month. Funding shortfalls also threaten essential healthcare services because aid agencies donate medicine and other critical resources to hospitals across the country. 

Afghanistan must also contend with a worsening climate crisis. After years of drought, more and more households are feeling the impact, and 30 out of 34 provinces in Afghanistan report extremely low water quality. 

At the same time Afghanistan is in the grips of a large human rights crisis, largely because the de facto authorities  target the rights of women and girls in Afghanistan, by excluding them from public and political life, economic activity and education, further exacerbating the humanitarian situation of the female population. 

The restrictions of  the Taliban including the December 2022 and April 2023 directives barring Afghan women from working for non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and UN agencies - continue to obstruct aid operations throughout the country and limit women and girls' access to humanitarian assistance.

The United Nations estimates that 22.9 million people - including 12.3 million children - will need humanitarian assistance and protection in 2025. According to the 2025 Afghanistan Humanitarian Needs and Response Plan (HNRP) - released by the UN in December -  some US$2.4 billion are needed to reach 16.8 million people with multi-sector support, including food, health, nutrition,
protection, shelter, and water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) assistance this year.

Although the number of people in need has dropped slightly this year, humanitarian sources say the reduction does not reflect a significant improvement in the humanitarian situation in Afghanistan compared to 2024. Due to a lack of funding and pressure from donor countries, aid agencies will implement a more rigorously targeted response in 2025, focusing on the most vulnerable in the areas with the most urgent needs, leaving millions of others with severe needs unmet.

In 2024,  23.7 million people - including 12.4 million children -  were in need of humanitarian assistance and protection.  29.2 million people - two-thirds of the country’s population - required humanitarian assistance in 2023. Among those in need were 15.8 million boys and girls.

The Afghanistan 2024 Humanitarian Response Plan (HRP) sought US$3.06 billion to reach 17.3 million of the most vulnerable people that year. As of February 2025, the HRP was only 52 percent funded. Such a large gap between existing needs and available funding severely hampers the delivery of life-saving assistance.  Despite these shortfalls and humanitarian access constraints, aid agencies reached 17.7 million people with humanitarian assistance in the country in 2024. 

In 2023, the United Nations and humanitarian partner organizations launched a revised appeal of 3.23 billion US Dollar to alleviate the plight of millions of people affected by the humanitarian crisis in the country. As of February 2024, the Afghanistan Humanitarian Response Plan 2023 was only 46 percent funded. In 2023, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) stopped food assistance to 10 million Afghans due to a massive funding shortfall.

In 2002, the UN had appealed for 4.44 billion US Dollar in funding for the Afghanistan crisis. As of December 2022, only 2.61 billion had been received from donors (59 percent coverage). 

More than three years after the Taliban seized power in Afghanistan, international aid agencies are warning that the country risks becoming a forgotten crisis without sustained international support and engagement. Although aid organizations have been providing humanitarian assistance for the past three years, while the international community effectively abandoned Afghanistan, their current efforts cannot address the problems of poverty, unemployment, and displacement.

Aid agencies stress that the ongoing crisis in Afghanistan cannot be addressed through humanitarian assistance alone, and that a comprehensive, sustained, and context-specific response from the international community is needed.

Afghanistan LocationThe security situation

In February 2020, the United States (US) and the Taliban signed the “US-Taliban Agreement,” which contained commitments by the US related to the withdrawal from Afghanistan of military forces of the US and its allies, as well as commitments by the Taliban related to security. Following a US drawdown of virtually all of its troops, a summer 2021 Taliban offensive quickly overran the country.

The Taliban, which refer to themselves as the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, seized Afghanistan’s capital city of Kabul on August 15, 2021, following the successive capture of several provincial capitals and territory in early August. Following the collapse of the Government of Afghanistan, economic and political instability has resulted in the deterioration of basic service provision across the country, increased prices of staple foods and fuel, reduced household purchasing power that constrain the ability of Afghan households to meet basic needs.

Despite the Taliban’s taking control of much of Afghanistan, other armed groups challenge their authority. UN agencies and non-governmental organizations continue to be on the ground. However, the Taliban takeover has complicated the conditions for the provision of humanitarian assistance, and the humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan has grown even more complex and severe.

While armed conflict has declined significantly since 2021, instability and armed attacks, including the use of improvised explosive devices, continue to pose a significant risk to civilians, and chronic poverty and high unemployment, particularly among women, are expected to continue to drive humanitarian needs in 2025. The situation is compounded by internal displacement and continued cross-border returns from Iran and Pakistan, straining already limited resources.

The actions of the de facto authorities against women and girls in the country - their exclusion from public and political life, from economic activity and from education - exacerbate both the economic crisis throughout the country and, in particular, the security and humanitarian situation of the female population.

Girls are banned from education beyond the sixth grade, including attending institutions that train midwives and nurses. Most women are prohibited from working in either the public or private sector. They are barred from visiting public parks, gyms, and baths. The Taliban have mandated that women cover their faces in public and cannot travel long distances without a male guardian, making Afghanistan the only country in the world to impose such prohibitions on women and girls.

In early April 2023, the Taliban issued an order banning women from working for the United Nations in the country. The de facto authorities had already issued an order on December 24, 2022, prohibiting all female employees of national and international non-governmental organizations (NGOs) from going to work.

Despite facing sanctions and not being formally recognized by any country as the legitimate government of Afghanistan, the Taliban have refused to heed widespread domestic and international calls to respect women's rights and form an inclusive government.

Critics blame the Taliban's restrictions for contributing to the humanitarian crisis and discouraging foreign donors. The Taliban have rejected claims that their misogynistic policies are jeopardizing the flow of humanitarian aid to Afghanistan, saying donors are politicizing aid.

The United Nations warned in December 2024 that women and girls are bearing the brunt of an ongoing "dangerous erosion" of human rights in Afghanistan, attributing the situation to a deliberate failure by the Taliban. Taliban leaders have systematically deprived women and girls of their basic rights, including the right to education, work, freedom of movement and expression, and the right to live free from violence.

According to rights groups, lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people in Afghanistan and others who do not conform to rigid gender norms (LGBTQI+ people) have faced growing desperation and serious threats to their safety and lives since the new rulers took full control of the country.

The Taliban government is not officially recognized by any country, and the UN has repeatedly rejected requests by Afghanistan's de facto authorities to represent the country internationally because of its restrictions on women's rights. The restrictions on women's human rights stem from dozens of decrees issued in recent years by the Taliban's reclusive supreme leader, Hibatullah Akhundzada, based on his strict interpretation of Islamic law.

In December 2024, the Afghan Ministry of Health abruptly ordered medical institutions across the country to stop enrolling female students, citing a new edict issued by Akhundzada. The move effectively shut down one of the last available avenues for girls to pursue higher education. In response, independent UN-appointed experts warned that Afghanistan's maternal and child health is already in crisis, with high rates of maternal and infant mortality. If implemented, the ban would exacerbate this crisis, with profound and long-lasting consequences.

The United Nations and global rights groups have repeatedly condemned the bans and called on the Taliban to reverse their actions and policies against women.

In January 2025, the Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) announced that he was seeking arrest warrants for senior Taliban leaders in Afghanistan accused of crimes against humanity, citing widespread persecution of the country's female population and LGBTQI+ population. Karim Khan said his office would soon file additional requests to arrest other senior Taliban members.

Karim Khan identified the first suspects as Taliban supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada and his chief justice Abdul Hakim Haqqani. The Chief Prosecutor said both bear criminal responsibility for the crime against humanity of gender-based persecution. The persecution has been ongoing since August 2021, when the Taliban regained control of Afghanistan and imposed their strict interpretation of Islamic law.

Donations

Your donation for the Afghanistan emergency can help United Nations agencies, international humanitarian non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and their local partners to rapidly provide water, food, medicine, shelter and other aid to the people who need it most.

To find other organizations to which you can donate, visit: Humanitarian Crisis Relief, Refugees and IDPs, Children in Need, Hunger and Food Insecurity, Medical Humanitarian Aid, Vulnerable Groups, Faith-Based Humanitarian Organizations, and Human Rights Organizations.

Further information

Last updated: 09/02/2025

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