The Taliban’s claim of having brought “stability” stands in stark contrast to mounting international evidence. Since their 2021 takeover, the Taliban regime has not evolved into a responsible state actor.
Instead, it has transformed state authority into an ideological project that provides space for groups such as the banned Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and other extremist networks, deepening Afghanistan’s isolation, weakening its economic foundations, and shifting the burden of these policies onto ordinary Afghan households.
This amounts to a threefold failure: a failure of legitimacy, a failure of security, and a failure of welfare.
The issue of TTP sanctuary is therefore not merely a security concern for Pakistan; it is fundamentally an Afghan national-interest challenge that undermines regional stability and the prospects for long-term peace.
The United Nations Security Council Monitoring Team has said that the Taliban’s claims that no terrorist groups operate from Afghan territory are “not credible.”
According to its assessment, the banned Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) continues to launch attacks from Afghan soil, with elements within the Taliban providing harbouring and facilitation for its operations.
The report estimates that around 6,000 TTP fighters are present across Afghan provinces and links them to more than 600 attacks inside Pakistan in 2025.
The Monitoring Team also highlights the economic cost of the crisis, estimating that border closures linked to insecurity are costing Afghanistan approximately $1 million per day, further straining an already fragile economy.
Each TTP attack launched from Afghan territory effectively acts as an economic penalty on the Afghan people—triggering border closures, disrupting trade, increasing risk, and prolonging Afghanistan’s diplomatic isolation.
The Taliban regime’s ideological alignment with the TTP has contributed to escalating cross-border tensions, loss of lives, disrupted commerce, and deepening isolation—outcomes that stand in direct contradiction to Afghanistan’s long-term national interests.
The legitimacy deficit is structural
UN Monitoring Team states that the Taliban “do not seek popular support or consent” and describes Hibatullah Akhundzada as the absolute ruler, isolated in Kandahar and operating in primarily religious terms.
It also reports that the Taliban do not recognize the need for public support for their policies. The following arguments will serve well: –
The Taliban is not merely an unpopular government. It is a power structure that rejects the very idea of popular consent.
Taliban figures who questioned girls’ education bans faced dismissal, exile, or detention, showing that the regime suppresses moderation inside its own ranks before it ever reaches the public.
Economic “growth”?
World Bank projects Afghanistan’s GDP to grow by 4.3% in FY2025, but population growth of 8.6%, driven by more than two million returnees, means GDP per capita is expected to decline by 4.0%.
The same report warns that rapid population growth is eroding per-capita income and that Afghanistan risks remaining trapped in low growth, high vulnerability, and humanitarian dependence.
A regime cannot claim recovery when national output rises on paper, but every Afghan’s share of that output is shrinking.
Returnees, drought, aid cuts, and border tensions have overwhelmed jobs and services. Taliban messaging celebrates aggregates while household welfare deteriorates.
Poverty and aid dependence expose governance failure
UNDP’s 2025 MPI estimates that 64.9% of Afghans, about 26.9 million people in 2023, were multidimensionally poor.
UNDP’s Socio-Economic Review found 75% of people subsistence-insecure in 2024, up from 69% in 2023. OCHA assessed 22.9 million people needing humanitarian assistance in 2025, while the 2026 plan estimates 21.9 million in need and targets 17.5 million for life-saving support.
World Bank says external financing underpins more than 40% of public revenues and donor-funded off- budget spending remains critical for basic services.
Taliban rule has not built a state; it has built an aid-dependent survival economy.
Afghanistan’s current-account deficit is projected to widen to 31.9% of GDP in 2025, showing continued dependence on external financing for imports and basic consumption.
Systematic gender exclusion is an economic & strategic disaster
UNDP reports that only 7% of women were employed outside the household in 2024, compared with 84% of men, and identifies Afghanistan as the most repressive country for women’s rights.
The UN Monitoring Team notes that bans on girls’ education and women’s employment have long-term economic effects because half the population is not educated or able to work freely.
Security Council has warned that peace and prosperity are unattainable until bans on women and girls are reversed.
The Taliban has removed half the country from the economy, then blames the world for Afghanistan’s poverty.
Restrictions on female nurses, midwives, and aid workers also weaken humanitarian delivery to Afghan women and children.
Taken together, the evidence presents a stark picture: the Taliban regime’s model of governance is not stabilizing Afghanistan but systematically undermining its future.
A state that rejects popular legitimacy, enables militant sanctuaries, weakens its own economic base, and excludes half its population from productive life cannot deliver sustainable peace or prosperity.
Until these structural failures are addressed—particularly the issue of militant safe havens and the reversal of policies that marginalize women—Afghanistan will remain trapped in a cycle of insecurity, economic fragility, and international isolation, with the costs borne most heavily by its own people.
