India’s policy change towards Taliban pragmatic

In late January 2024, Chinese President Xi Jinping received credentials from the envoy of Taliban regime raising eyebrows of other countries, which had avoided giving it diplomatic recognition in view of its refusal to allow women to receive higher education, respect human rights and broad-base its government. A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman subsequently clarified that China was merely engaging the new Taliban government to provide humanitarian aid and foster economic cooperation and by receiving the Ambassador, it had not given the diplomatic recognition to the new government.

Following the same approach, India has made a few changes in its policy towards the Taliban regime. First, some India-based personnel of its embassy in Afghanistan returned to Kabul in June 2022 as a “technical team” to monitor the delivery of its humanitarian assistance for the Afghan people. Second, India allowed the Taliban to take de facto control of its diplomatic missions in India in November 2023 and the Ambassador posted by the earlier Afghan government left India.

Earlier this month, a senior official of India’s External Affairs Ministry, JP Singh, Head of Pakistan-Afghanistan Division, met Taliban Defence Minister Mohammad Yaqub Mujahid and Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi in Kabul to discuss ways to expand bilateral relations and accelerate the delivery of humanitarian assistance using the Chabahar port, now being operated by an Indian company. India is also considering the request of the Taliban government to appoint a Second Secretary Ikramuddin Kamil in its Consulate in Mumbai.

There are a number of reasons for change in India’s policy towards the Taliban regime. First, despite a policy of application of economic sanctions and withholding of recognition, the Taliban have not relented on providing higher education for women or respecting other human rights.

There is a tussle between the ISIS and the Al Qaida (an associate of Taliban) on the declaration of the Caliphate, with the ISIS declaring itself as the Caliphate in the territory seized by the group in Iraq and Syria in 2014. Taliban’s leader Mullah Haibatullah Akhundzada described the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (IEOA) as the ‘first legitimate emirate’ since the fall of the Ottoman caliphate in 1924. Al Qaida has pledged loyalty to IEOA accepting Akhundzada as the “Commander of the Believers”.

Second, the Taliban rule over 40 million Afghans and its government hosts 18 foreign embassies and maintains the same number of foreign embassies abroad. Most regional countries such as Pakistan, China, Russia, Central Asian states, Iran and others are maintaining resident embassies in Kabul and Taliban missions in their capitals. The earlier fear of the Taliban regime not being able to control the terror groups on its soil has proven exaggerated as it has successfully relocated various terror groups from the border to other areas, or has placed their fighters among its units to control them. Only the Tehreek-e-Taliban poses some problems as it has considerable followers and independent support in the Pashtun areas bordering Pakistan. In that sense, its control of the territory of Afghanistan has improved.

Third, its relations with Pakistan have worsened. The Pakistani terror groups no longer have uncontrolled access in the Afghan territory. Though, there have been isolated reports of movement of some terrorists, weapons and equipment left over by the Americans and drugs from Afghanistan into Jammu and Kashmir and Punjab via both Pakistan and Iran, our hopes of controlling these are better with improved relations with Taliban. India was working earlier on about 500 projects in road construction, supply of drinking water and medical facilities besides providing humanitarian assistance. These can be executed better with improved presence in Afghanistan.

During meetings with the Indian officials, Taliban ministers have expressed interest in “stronger bilateral political and economic ties and easier visas for Afghan businessmen to travel to India”. They are also keen to reduce their dependence on Pakistan for economic, transport and other assistance. Its Deputy PM for Economic Affairs, Mullah Baradar, paid a visit to the Chabahar port in November 2023 and expressed interest in boosting trade with India via this port.

Afghanistan is suffering extreme humanitarian crisis due to contraction of its economy by 27 per cent in 2021 following Taliban’s takeover. The economy grew by 2.7 per cent in 2023-24 with growth in agriculture, industry, and services contributing to the recovery. The humanitarian aid, inward remittances and custom duties provided the main revenues. The improvement in long-term economic prospects depend on internal policy reforms and resumption of external aid.

The Taliban leadership prefer to maintain their conservative orthodox policies as a result of which the western donors have not agreed to resume aid. The regime wants external investments and development of infrastructure, particularly roads, railways, drinking water, irrigation, agriculture and health but the lack of infrastructure facilities poses a major constraint.

For the first time after coming into power, the Taliban sent a delegation to the ongoing UN climate change talks in Azerbaijan to get some support from the international community to deal with extreme weather like erratic rainfall, prolonged droughts and flash floods. The Afghan delegation said it had prepared a national action plan to deal with climate change and it was ready to talk to the USA and other countries to discuss their mitigation and adaptation proposals.

Though the security situation has improved with fewer attacks by the ISIS in the last two years, it has still not provided enough confidence to investors from other countries such as China to construct new roads, rail lines and exploit rich mineral resources in the country. While the western sanctions have eased with the grant of US exemptions in some cases, it is hard for foreign investors to get loans for building the infrastructure in Afghanistan. Still, many countries have concluded that it is better to engage the Taliban patiently rather than ostracise them to resolve the many problems they are facing.