Afghan Taliban: 3 Years On
The Taliban returned to power in Afghanistan on August 15, 2021. It’s been three years since America’s strategic defeat and the chaotic withdrawal opened the doors for the Taliban’s comeback. Ambassador Gautam Mukhopadhaya, India’s former envoy to Afghanistan analyses the internal and external dynamics three years on. He speaks to StratNews Global Associate Editor Amitabh P. Revi on ‘The Gist’. The former envoy says,”It should not be lost that India has remained relevant in Afghanistan. In particular against other players whose interests are inimical to India-Pakistan and China. It has also been able to incrementally increase its engagement with the Taliban. Since 2021, when we had virtually no relationship, India has built up a relationship, established a technical team (in the embassy in Kabul). This above all without crossing over into the area of formal legitimisation of the Taliban”.
History’s Ironic Twist
Pakistan’s military arrested retired Lt General Faiz Hameed, former head of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) spy agency, on corruption charges on August 12, 2024. The irony is not lost on anyone who remembers his gloating photograph in Kabul’s Serena Hotel after the Taliban retook the country in 2021. Ambassador Mukhopadhaya points out, “It’s ironic. It is the Pakistani Taliban that now have Afghanistan as their strategic depth. Which, of course, Pakistan was seeking for itself through the Taliban. So, Pakistan has come face to face with the limitations of its own strategy. And, I don’t see a clear resolution to this, in the near future. This will be a festering sore that will continue between Afghanistan and Pakistan for some time. But the the genie was let out of the bottle by the Pakistanis. They now have to pay for it.”
India Matters In Afghanistan
“For India,” Ambassador Mukhopadhaya points out, “two considerations remain important. One is that we do not lose contact on the ground as we did in the first round of the Taliban(which was in power between 1996-2001 first). That means we are in touch with the people. My general impression is that while those who have left Afghanistan will be unhappy with the relationship, those who are inside Afghanistan would still prefer to see India inside rather than outside. And literally surrendering the field to outsiders, to all countries and interests that are inimical to us”.
Ambassador Mukhopadhaya also discusses:
- Afghan Taliban: 3 Years On in terms of internal dynamics.
- The Taliban’s external equations.
- India’s current and future role.
- China’s inroads, especially in the Mes Aynak copper mine.
- How India could and should respond.
- Afghan Taliban, TTP and Pakistan faultlines across the Durand Line.
- Terrorism, Al Qaida, Daesh/ISKP and ETIM.
- The U.S. position of disinvolvement yet providing $21 billion over the last 3 years.
- Russia’s increasing engagement.
- and Iran’s hot-and-cold relationship with the Taliban.
Also See:
In August 2022, StratNews Global’s team of Amitabh P. Revi and Rohit Pandita travelled to report from Kabul. These are the exclusive interviews they filmed then.
