KABUL: The United Nations (UN) Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, held a second day of negotiations with world powers on how to deal with Taliban leaders of Afghanistan, while the Kabul administration warned that the meeting could be “counter-productive.”
The talks in Doha were arranged after the Taliban government barred Afghan women from working for the United Nations (UN), prompting the world body to put its massive relief operations in Afghanistan under review. The Taliban also banned women from working for other NGOs and barred them from almost all university and secondary education and most government jobs.
The Afghanistan talks involve envoys from the United States (US), China, Russia and 20 other countries and organisations, including neighbours such as Pakistan and major European donors, but exclude the Taliban government.
“Any meeting without the participation of Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan(IEA) representatives — the main party to the Afghan issue — is unproductive and even sometimes counter-productive,” said Suhail Shaheen, the head of the Taliban political office in Doha.
The Afghan Foreign Minister, Amir Khan Muttaqi, who is subject to a UN travel ban, will lead a delegation to Islamabad at the end of the week for talks with Chinese and Pakistani officials, the ministry said on Tuesday. The UN Security Council (UNSC) last week unanimously condemned the ban on its Afghan women employees, which the world body says has seriously threatened its efforts to aid the population.
UN talks can lead to legitimising Taliban government
Women’s rights groups staged protests on Saturday over concerns that the UN talks in Doha could lead to steps towards legitimising the Taliban government, which came to power in August 2021.
However, UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric clarified on Monday that such recognition was not up for discussion in the closed-door talks. Instead, the meeting would focus on discussing human rights, including those of women, as well as the governance of Afghanistan and ways to counter terrorism and drug trafficking, according to Dujarric.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is seeking a common understanding with the international community on how to engage with the Taliban on these issues. The UN’s review of its Afghanistan operations is expected to be completed by Friday, and the organisation faces a difficult decision on whether to maintain its presence in the country.
