afghanistansmall population of semi-sedentary Arabs who claim descent from the
Arab Muslim invaders. 2
Any discussion of ethnolinguistic groups in Afghanistan is complex and
all maps of ethnic distribution in the country have to be regarded as rough
guides only and treated with considerable caution. Apart from the moun-
tainous regions of the southern Pushtun belt, which tend to be divided by
traditional tribal boundaries, many communities, and all of Afghanistan’s
urban centres, are, to one degree or another, multi-ethnic. In rural commun-
ities, different ethnicities live in their own self-managing quarters, or mahalas,
but all participate in the management of the wider community affairs.
Pushtuns, while they are affiliated by birth to a particular tribe, do
not share a common ancestral or genetic origin. Tribal genealogies assert
various descents, most of which are mythical and include Persian, Turkish,
Kurdish, Arab, Armenian and Jewish. While Pushtu is the majority
language of the Pushtu heartland on the Afghan–Pakistan frontier, many
Pushtuns, especially urbanized ones, barely speak this language. In the
Khushk district of Herat and along the Hari Rud settled Pushtuns speak
Persian or even Turkmani as their mother tongue.
A similar situation applies to the Uzbeks, Turkmans and Hazaras. The
Uzbeks are a conglomeration of Turco-Mongolian tribes who mostly settled
in the region following the conquests of Chinggis Khan in the thirteenth
century, while there are several Turkman tribes represented in Afghanistan.
Under the influence of Western ethnology, many Hazaras today claim
descent from the Mongol garrisons of Chinggis Khan or even the Mongol
conqueror himself. The Hazaras certainly do have Mongol blood and heri-
tage, and their dialect of Persian, Hazaragi, contains Mongolian-derivative
vocabulary.3 However, their ethnicity is mixed and includes genetic links
to the Persianate and Turkic peoples who lived in this region before and
after the Arab Muslim invasion.
Afghanistan’s size and mountainous topography has always posed chal-
lenges to communications and governance and has encouraged a strong
sense of regional autonomy. Despite major improvements in road commu-
nications since 2001, there is still only one sealed, all-weather road linking
Kabul with the northern capital of Mazar-i Sharif and Kabul with Kandahar
and Herat. In rural Afghanistan many roads are only fit for four-wheel drive
vehicles and many people still rely on donkeys or horses, while the poor
will walk many hours to reach local markets or obtain medical assistance.
The chain of mountains that dominates the centre of the country
effectively divided the country in two and, prior to the establishment of
the modern state of Afghanistan, these mountains were regarded as the