Afghan law students and young lawyers in Afghanistan have been reporting on the ground from that country since the Taliban took Kabul in August 2021. Here, one of our correspondents in Kabul reflects on the one-year anniversary of the final departure of American soldiers from Afghan soil. For privacy and security reasons, we are withholding our correspondent’s name. The text has only been lightly edited to respect the author’s voice.

Twelve months ago, on 31 August 2021, the last American soldier left Afghanistan from Kabul airport. Moments after Major General Christopher T. Donahue’s departure, the Taliban took over the airport and declared victory. Since then a horrible lie has been shoved down the throat of Afghans, as the Taliban are trying their hardest to perpetuate a narrative in which they are the heroes who drove back the Americans.

Cruel, dismissive American foreign policy over the years and the Biden administration’s cowardly withdrawal from Afghanistan has left a narrative void in this story. The Taliban have been using this to justify their years of terror attacks on Afghan civilians and military. The claim of independence and liberation by the Taliban showed it hollowness when the Taliban tried to celebrate August 15 –  the day Kabul fell. People instead called the day a “black day”, and social media was filled with stories of people’s shock and the immediate sense of loss and despair Kabul citizens experienced then, which by far overshadowed the celebrations of the Taliban. Now in their most recent attempt to honor themselves, the Taliban have declared 31 August to be a national holiday, an event to be celebrated.

Right now it’s just past midnight here in Kabul and my family and I are all in our basement as the sky is filled with bullets and the roar of machine guns and rifles is ringing in our ears—a by-product of Taliban celebrating. Afghan people feared and hated the idea of once again living under an extremist regime, but on the other hand Afghans did not have any love of the Americans or the former Afghan administration either. The Taliban took advantage of the uncertainty of the people during the war and it seems that still has its use. Since people wouldn’t celebrate the day Kabul fell to the Taliban and mourned that day, the Taliban think they might be more easily persuaded to celebrate the so-called defeat of the US, to extort an implied and even momentary approval from people by using the sense of patriotic pride among Afghans.

The Taliban will celebrate whatever fantasy they want to believe in. But on the next day this country will be still the only country on the planet where girls are not allowed to go to school, where women are still not allowed to work, food crises are endemic and hardship penetrates every aspect of our daily lives.