A meeting in Dubai between Indian Foreign Minister Vikram Misri and Taliban Deputy Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi on Wednesday confirmed India’s intention to increase its influence over Afghanistan’s leadership, analysts said. There is.
India has gradually strengthened its ties with the Taliban over the past year, but the talks were the first high-level engagement of its kind.
India has invested more than $3 billion in aid and reconstruction projects in Afghanistan over the past two decades, and a statement from the Indian Ministry of External Affairs highlighted the usual issues of regional development, trade, humanitarian cooperation, and even an agreement to restart development projects. Shown. and to support Afghanistan’s health sector and refugees.
But what was not said in that statement, which signaled a change in the region’s geopolitical realities, was evident in the timing and agenda of the meeting.
For one, the meeting came just days after India condemned Pakistan’s airstrikes in Afghanistan that allegedly killed at least 46 people last month.
This also follows the Taliban’s appointment of a consular representative at the Afghan consulate in Mumbai last November.
The Indian government did not comment on the appointment, which coincided with a visit to Kabul by the joint secretary of India’s foreign ministry in the same month.
The Taliban’s deployment to Mumbai of Ikramuddin Kamil, a former Afghan Indian student turned Taliban diplomat, joins a growing list of countries including Russia, China, Turkiye, Iran and Uzbekistan. , allowing the Taliban to take over operations in India. Afghanistan embassy. Earlier, in 2022, India also sent a small technical team to partially reopen its embassy in Kabul.
Strategic shift?
These recent events indicate deepening ties between New Delhi and Kabul, observers say.
But Kabir Taneja, deputy director and research fellow at Observer Research Foundation, an Indian think tank, said the move may not be as strategic a shift as it seems. “This is just the natural progression of India’s cautious and long-term approach to the Taliban reality in Kabul since 2021,” he said. “The Taliban is a reality for India, as it is for other neighboring countries, and ignoring Afghanistan and the Afghan people is not an option.”
Raghav Sharma, an associate professor at the Jindal School of International Studies in New Delhi, agreed. “I think this is a continuation of our previous policy where we had a kind of engagement with the Taliban, but we don’t want to acknowledge too much the depth of our engagement,” he said, adding that policies emerge from these conversations. He pointed out that there are almost no
“We have remained on the periphery when it comes to diplomatic engagement with the Taliban,” he added, referring to a study by the Washington Institute, a US think tank, that analyzed international engagement with the Taliban. The study found that countries such as Qatar, China and Turkiye are at the forefront of developing relations with the Taliban, with Pakistan coming in fifth place in terms of influence.
“India is not even on the list,” Sharma said.
“India has long maintained that Afghanistan is a strategically important country and that we have historical ties, but then we have to move forward with the talks,” Sharma added. “After the fall of the republican government, we put Afghanistan in cold storage and responded on an ad hoc basis only when necessary.”
India’s passive attitude remains
One positive development that could come from this is the prospect of visas for Afghans, Taneja said. “The main takeaway from Mr. Misri and Mr. Muttaqi’s engagement is that India may be close to temporarily resuming visas for Afghans, particularly in the trade, health tourism, and education sectors.” he said.
India was criticized for suspending visas for Afghans, including medical and student visas, following the Taliban takeover in 2021. Since then, India has issued few visas to Afghans. “The time has come for New Delhi to do this,” Taneja said. “This will come as a relief to many Afghan nationals who were using India as their preferred option for higher education, healthcare, etc.”
Sharma said expectations that more visas would be issued were low due to security concerns. “After all, the Taliban are an ideological movement and their return to power has led to accelerated radicalization, which will be difficult,” he said.
India also needs to continue its involvement in the region. “We believe that by keeping the channels open with the Taliban, we can at least engage with them on some issues that are important to India. Whether the Taliban can achieve results is another question,” he said. Because what influence do we have over the Taliban?” he added.
Sharma said the talks were needed more by the Taliban than by India. The group has been in military conflict with Pakistan, a former Taliban ally, and wants to prove it has a broader range of options.
“They (the Taliban) especially want to show (autonomy) to Pakistan. But it also means that the Taliban have no strategic autonomy, no government institutions and are just pawns of Pakistan. It also helps counter the propaganda that comes with it,” he said, referring to the portrayal of the Taliban on the international stage that analysts say is influenced by them. Pakistani military facility.
Careful steps or just lack of strategy?
There are other reasons why India is reluctant to further cooperate with the Taliban. Analysts say closer ties could plunge the world’s largest democracy into an ethical quagmire.
“India has long tried to promote itself and establish itself as the world’s largest democracy, but it has failed to even denounce the ban on girls’ education in Afghanistan. There is total silence on these issues. So what signal are we sending to people back home?” Sharma asked.
India maintains a strong presence in Afghanistan and was one of the first countries to send a diplomatic mission after the Taliban collapsed in 2001. However, despite its significant interests in the region, India lacked a coherent policy towards Afghanistan.
“Any maneuvers that India has undertaken have always been carried out in alignment with the other powers that we have an interest in. In the past, it was mainly Iran and Russia, and then the United States,” Sharma said. Ta. After the collapse of the US-backed republican government, India found itself in a new situation.
Sharma reiterated that India has put Afghanistan in “cold storage” as many countries around the world quickly try to adapt to the new reality. He said even the United States is “cooperating with the Taliban on counterterrorism efforts to deal with ISKP.” ISKP (Islamic State of Khorasan Province) is a local branch of ISIL (ISIS) and is known to operate within Afghanistan.
At the same time, “countries like Iran, which have enabled and facilitated the Taliban, and even Pakistan, have kept lines of communication open to the insurgents,” Sharma added. “Iran has opposition figures like Ismael Khan. The Tajik government, which was initially very critical of the Taliban, is now less so and continues to embrace the rebels.”
“All our eggs go into the Taliban’s basket.”
Stakeholders in the region are currently assessing what the incoming Trump administration in the United States will mean for the Taliban.
“Afghan political awareness is declining in Washington, D.C.,” Taneja said. The country remains an important security position, but “it will not be superseded by more pressing issues such as Gaza, Iran or Ukraine.”
It’s hard to say what will happen next, he added. “Trump’s strategy is similar to predicting the weather every day. But Taliban insurgents trying to gain strength will be more accessible and listened to under the Trump administration than under the Biden administration. Maybe.”
After all, despite being the region’s most powerful power, India has failed to engage with diverse players in Afghanistan, isolating its interests in the long run. “Initially, we made the mistake of putting all our eggs in (Hamid) Karzai’s (former Afghan president) basket and then in (Ashraf) Ghani’s basket. We have done similar work in Bangladesh. We supported Sheikh Hasina with all our might.”
India may also lack a critical understanding of Afghan society, which could take time to repair, Taneja said.
“It’s not just about developing bonds at the political level, it’s also about understanding how a particular socio-political system works. I don’t think we have that understanding in India, which is ironic. In fact, we are geographically (and) culturally close to India, but in terms of trying to understand the society, we have invested very little,” he says. .
“I think we are repeating the same mistakes and putting all our eggs in the Taliban’s basket,” Taneja said, warning that the political situation in Afghanistan has always been very volatile.
“The ground changes very quickly,” he added.
