*3.1. Data*

For the analysis, historical temperature, precipitation, and river discharge data recorded from about 1960 to 1979 at gauging stations installed within the Kunduz River Basins are analyzed. Between 1979 and 2009, or even later, there are no data records due to political turmoil in the country available. The recent data from 2009 to 2019 are, with some exceptions, available. The data for available years are listed in Table 1. Only meteorological and river discharge stations with over 20 years of data records have been used in the study and stations with less data available neglected in order to have a minimum of confidence in the time series (discussed in more detail in Section 5.1). The hydrological and meteorological data were provided by the Ministry of Energy and Water and Afghanistan Meteorological Department. The river discharge data are also provided by the same ministry [30].

**Table 1.** Overview of gauges and meteorological stations in the Kunduz River basin, including drainage area, elevation, and the period for which data are available.


For topographical and hydrological mapping, remote-sensing data and satellite images from sources, including National Geographic and Esri, were accessed and processed using ArcGIS software (https://www.arcgis.com/home/item.html?id=b9b1b422198944fbbd5250b3241691b6). For the LULC classification, Landsat 5 Thematic Mapper (TM) scenes and Landsat 8 Operational Land Imager (OLI) have been used [31].
