May 31, 2024

Russia inches closer to recognising the Taliban

topic:	Human Rights
located:	Afghanistan, Russia
editor:	Shadi Khan Saif

At odds with the US-led Western world, Russia has now indicated its intention to de-list Afghanistan’s Taliban as a terrorist group.

Moscow’s top man for Kabul, Zamir Kabulov, the special presidential envoy for Afghanistan, told state-run news agency Tass that delisting would help decide whether and when to recognise the Taliban government. “Without this [removal of the ban on the Taliban], it will be premature to talk about recognition…therefore, work on this issue continues. All considerations have been reported to the top leadership of Russia. We are waiting for a decision."

His boss, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, has gone on to say the Taliban is the “real power” in Afghanistan and that the group’s possible removal from Moscow’s list of banned organisations reflects “objective reality.”

No foreign country has formally recognised the Taliban as legitimate rulers more than two years since the group toppled a US-backed democracy and established a hardline Islamist rule in August 2021. The Taliban have alienated women in all aspects of public life by banning education above grade six and drastically limiting their movement and work rights through systematic curbs, threats and persecution.

The Western world has been urging the Taliban to lift these restrictions and form an inclusive government consisting of all representative groups of Afghans. The lack of willingness to change shown by the Taliban has resulted in Afghanistan facing crippling international isolation along with severe banking system restrictions.

Most of Afghanistan’s neighbours have struck lucrative mining deals with the Taliban in a bid to exploit the country’s natural resources with little or no benefit to the population suffering an oppressive regime while enduring a worst humanitarian crisis.

Opposition groups in Afghanistan believe the democratic world’s lack of engagement has only aggravated the situation and allowed the Taliban to consolidate more power at the cost of people’s rights and liberties.

The former Soviet Union, Russia’s predecessor, was battling the same Islamists for decades in Afghanistan when the West was harbouring them as ‘Mujahideens’, resulting in death and destruction on a mammoth scale. And now, with shifting priorities and lingering rifts between the global powers, a deadly sense of déjà vu lingers for Afghans.

Image by Дмитрий Осипенко.

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