Open Markets: Documenting Arms Availability in Afghanistan under the Taliban

More than three years after the Taliban’s takeover and its seizure of the previous regime’s weapons stockpiles, the de facto authorities have taken steps to exert control over arms and ammunition in the hands of rank-and-file fighters, civilians, and private businesses. Yet despite the recent legal restrictions and their enforcement efforts, informal arms commerce and trafficking continue, and involves both older weapons as well as materiel likely sourced from the equipment that had been delivered to the former Afghan National Defence and Security Forces.

Open Markets: Documenting Arms Availability in Afghanistan under the Taliban—a new Briefing Paper from the Small Arms Survey’s Afghanistan project—reviews field investigations conducted from 2022 to 2024 into the availability and prices of small arms, light weapons, accessories, and ammunition at informal markets in the Afghanistan–Pakistan border areas, alongside qualitative research into arms proliferation dynamics.