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Loya jirga

Loya jirga, occasionally loya jirgah, is a large meeting held in Afghanistan, originally attended by Pashtun groups but later including other ethnic groups. The attendees variously include tribal or regional leaders, political, military and religious figures, royalty, government officals, etc. The meetings are called irregularly, often by the ruler.

The word is from the Pashto language -- loya means "great" or "grand" and jirga means "council", "assembly" or "meeting".

In September 2001, there were four different loya jirga movements anticipating the end of Taliban rule. There was little communication between each of them:

Loya jirgas in the history of Afghanistan include:

References

wikipedia.org dumped 2003-03-17 with terodump