Five years after returning to power, Afghanistan’s Taliban authorities have established working relationships with a growing number of countries despite the lack of broad formal recognition.
Russia remains the only country to officially recognise the Taliban government, while many Western countries have called for domestic reforms on human rights before considering recognition.
Nevertheless, numerous countries, including Britain and European Union members, continue to engage with Afghanistan’s leaders, largely for practical reasons.
Taliban seek relations with all countries
Outside the high walls of the foreign ministry in central Kabul are embassies, rows of travel agencies and an airline billboard carrying the message: “We’re all connected.”
Although few Afghans can afford to travel abroad, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said the government “seeks relations with all countries”.
The authorities’ diplomatic strategy has included hosting foreign envoys in Kabul and frequently publishing photographs of the meetings. Representatives from China, Japan, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Britain have visited.
“The countries of the region and our neighbouring states have particular importance, because our economic ties and interests are closely linked,” Mujahid said last month.
Officials from Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan gathered in Kabul this year as landlocked Central Asian countries seek trade routes through Afghanistan to gain access to the sea beyond.
Erica Gaston, who was part of a team mandated by the UN Security Council to identify strategies for addressing challenges in Afghanistan, said regional countries had been “always more pragmatic” in dealing with the Taliban authorities.
“You had much more receptivity among regional member states to say, ‘this is the reality that we have in our region and engagement is inevitable’,” said Gaston, who heads the Conflict Prevention and Sustaining Peace Programme at the United Nations University Centre for Policy Research.
Engagement grows despite human rights concerns
Alongside security coordination, Taliban officials have promoted cross-border infrastructure projects aimed at supporting the country’s fragile economy as Afghans face the impact of international aid cuts.
The government has also expanded the mining sector, seeing potential in the country’s untapped natural resources and attracting firms from neighbouring China and elsewhere.
However, foreign funding has remained limited as investors remain wary of the Taliban government’s lack of widespread official recognition. Reports that Iran might follow Russia in recognising the government have also failed to materialise.
Despite these challenges, Taliban officials have continued travelling abroad. In June, a delegation travelled to Brussels for talks with 15 EU countries on the return of failed asylum-seekers to Afghanistan.
A spokesperson for the bloc told AFP that those without a legal right to remain in Europe must be returned.
Germany has taken a leading role, deporting an Afghan who had not been convicted of any crime for the first time since the Taliban returned to power in 2021, Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt said in July.
Gaston said the passage of time had meant that “more and more countries accept that this is the reality, even if it’s a reality that they don’t like or condone”.
However, many countries have limited deeper ties until they see changes in Afghanistan, particularly over restrictions that prevent girls from continuing their education beyond the age of 12.
No policy shift is expected on that issue.
The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants last year for Supreme Leader Hibatullah Akhundzada and chief justice Abdul Hakim Haqqani, accusing them of crimes against humanity over the persecution of women and girls.
Afghan women also remain barred from a range of places, including UN premises, a rule that remains in force despite a visit to Afghanistan last month by the heads of two UN agencies.
A UN source in Kabul, speaking anonymously because of the sensitivity of the issue, said the ability to influence the authorities remained “highly issue-dependent”.
“Some of these issues are kind of fairly impenetrable, but then you have other issues on which you are able to make progress,” the source told AFP, citing positive relations in some parts of Afghanistan on counternarcotics and humanitarian access.
Regional diplomacy reflects changing political reality
Several countries became involved this year when Afghanistan and Pakistan went to war, with China hosting talks after hundreds of civilians were killed.
Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Iran, Turkey, Uzbekistan and Malaysia were also involved in efforts to stop the fighting, according to the UN.
India, Pakistan’s arch-rival, has also strengthened its ties with the Taliban government. New Delhi secured a sanctions waiver last year allowing Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi to travel to India.
In June, India’s UN envoy suggested that a rethink was needed on sanctions, including a travel ban, asset freeze and arms embargo targeting dozens of Taliban members.
“The political reality of Afghanistan has changed in the last five years, and the current UN sanctions regime must take that into account,” said Harish Parvathaneni.
The diplomat did not detail what the new approach should involve. However, the UN source told AFP that engagement with the Afghan government was “the current state of play”.
“Everybody recognises the fact that, essentially, Afghanistan is fully controlled by the de facto (Taliban) authorities and, essentially, there are multiple issues on which the world, the region, has to deal with them,” the source said.
