Russia ties Taliban recognition to inclusive govt

KABUL (Pajhwok): Russia desires the full diplomatic recognition of the Taliban administration if a truly inclusive government is installed in Afghanistan.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told a media briefing in Moscow on Tuesday: “We want to work towards the full diplomatic recognition of the new authorities in Afghanistan …”

Following talks with UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, Lavrov reminded the Taliban of keeping their promise about forming a broad-based government.

“It is the political inclusiveness that should determine our further moves, especially since the Taliban have proclaimed this aim,” TASS news agency quoted him as saying.

He added Moscow had also been in touch with other political forces in Afghanistan, including former president Hamid Karzai and former chief of the Afghan High Council for National Reconciliation Abdullah Abdullah.

“They are interested in dialogue with the Taliban, and in our contacts with the movement. We encourage them to have this dialogue launched and continued substantively,” he remarked.

Lavrov maintained Russia and Taliban were in regular contacts through their embassies and via other relevant channels.

During the presence of the Soviet contingent in Afghanistan, more than 140 enterprises had been built there, the minister recalled.

“Let me note in parentheses that not a single enterprise was built in 20 years by the NATO coalition,” he said. “You know what it came down to and how it ended.”

The Russian Foreign Ministry had sent in early April a note to the Afghan Embassy to recognise Jamal Garwal as Afghanistan’s charge d’affaires in Moscow.

PAN Monitor/mud