Two years have passed since the Taliban entered Kabul and took control of Afghanistan. Today the country continues mired in a political stalemate. Regional and Western actors disagree on how to treat the Taliban.
Following the withdrawal of all foreign troops from Afghanistanthe West continues to wage a culture war and USA and their allies want the Taliban to lift their restrictions on women’s rights, but the Taliban do not accept what they see as a feminist agenda. They are neither there nor are they expected for something like this.
In the peace talks held in Doha before August 2021, Taliban proxies offered to share power with opposing Afghan factions in the name of ending the conflict. But ever since they won the war, they have reserved the right to exclude non-Taliban politicians from the cabinet.
Sanctions, asset freezes and other economic restrictions that isolate Afghanistan have diminished their chances of recovering from an economic crisis that, for the past two years, United Nations It has been described as the world’s greatest humanitarian disaster. Banking, aviation and other critical sectors are paralyzed. More than half of the country’s population cannot meet their basic household needs. Humanitarian aid pledges have dwindled as donors have withdrawn.
For the good of millions of Afghans, regional actors and Western governments and institutions should strive to establish more functional relations with the Taliban, but it seems mission impossible, the prospect of reincorporation of Afghanistan the community of nations is still far away, something that does not facilitate the peace, stability and security of the country.
Most of the residents of Afghanistan they wanted the foreign troops out and were glad when the American withdrawal ended an extraordinarily deadly war. But now that US forces are no longer fighting transnational militants in the region, the neighbors of Afghanistan they worry that the Taliban cannot, or will not, fill the vacuum.
Pakistanwhich has supported the Taliban since the group’s inception in the 1990s, wants Kabul take strong measures againstTehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan» (TTP), a jihadist group in intermittent war with Islamabad since 2007.
He TTP has presence in Afghanistandespite denial by the Taliban, and incidents related to the TTP in Pakistan have increased since mid-2021, resulting in three times more fatalities than in the two years prior to the decision Kabul by the Taliban.
ChinaFor its part, it wants the Taliban to hand over the “Uyghur” militants based in Afghanistan, but the Taliban have only adopted a resettlement policy taking them away from the Afghan-Chinese border. The countries of Central Asia they have similar security concerns and receive identical responses.
It is also very worrying for most of the neighbours, and for Western countries, the continued presence of the Islamic State of Greater Khorasanin Afghanistan (iskp) which is the subsidiary of isis in the region. Neighboring countries remain concerned that it may continue to use Afghanistan as a base of operations and information sharing remains very limited because the Taliban have not established much trust with regional and international security agencies.
Your neighbors need to stop illegal immigrants, drugs, weapons and jihadists from crossing into your territory from Afghanistan
Nor do they help surveillance teams from the UNwho used to visit Afghanistan to research and publish analyzes of the terrorist threatscan enter the territory.
From elsewhere, Afghanistan has observer status in the Shanghai Cooperation OrganizationFounded by China and Russia in 2001 and that includes all the residents of Afghanistan. The Taliban want to participate in their security discussions, but even this organization is reluctant to welcome the Taliban and the authorities of Kabul.
The economic and security problems of Afghanistan cannot be ignored indefinitely, especially since the people who suffer the most from instability and deprivation are often the most vulnerable population and among them women and the children. The international arena cannot remain on the sidelines, they need support.
Pursuing and supporting regional cooperation can be a long and winding road, but today it is the only way. At the beginning of the year there was a modest advance in Dohawhen the Secretary General of the UN, Antonio Guterresconvened a meeting of international envoys to Afghanistan.
The envoys agreed that the adequate conditions for the recognition of the Taliban did not exist, although they did not detail them. But in his public comments, Guterres concluded that such meetings must continue, in order to fight the terrorism and the drug trafficking and promote the inclusion and rights of women, which are below minimums.
After the Security Council of the UN commissioned an independent review of all international engagement with Afghanistan. That report will be delivered next November.
Afghanistan remains at a standstill and without a realistic path to escape sanctions and take up a seat in the United Nations. Formal diplomatic recognition of the Taliban could take years and objectively it is not seen as possible.
