Thousands of Afghan religious scholars and tribal elders gathered in the capital Thursday for a men-only meeting the Taliban hope will rubber-stamp their hardline Islamic rule.
Officials have provided scant details of the “jirga” – a traditional gathering of influential people that settles differences by consensus – and the media is also barred from attending.
It comes a week after a powerful earthquake struck the east of the country killing over 1,000 people and leaving tens of thousands homeless.
Even before the quake, the Taliban were struggling to administer a country that had long been in the grip of economic malaise, utterly dependent on foreign aid that dried up with the overthrow of the Western-backed government in August.