Friendly Taliban regime in Afghanistan will serve India’s strategic interests

Four years back, India was an enemy country for the Taliban

- AJAY KAUL

In international relations, there are no permanent friends or permanent enemies.

A country or entity, which may be or may have been hostile or inimical towards a particular country, may someday become friendly with that nation, if it suits their interests.

The perfect example in this context is the relationship between the Taliban, a Muslim extremist militia of Afghanistan, and India.

Four years back, India was an enemy country for the Taliban that was involved into terror attacks, mostly at the behest of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI).

However, now, a complete turnaround has been noticed in its perception about India and its approach towards Afghanistan.

As a result, Afghanistan's Foreign Affairs Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi recently completed his first visit to India.

Muttaqi was here on a 7-day visit, beginning October 9, in response to an official invitation from India.

The landmark visit, symbolises that it had a message from the Taliban to Islamabad -- “We refuse to be your proxies anymore’.

Through the visit, the Taliban regime conveyed to Pakistan that it will follow its independent foreign policy and view different countries through its own prism.

Rubbing it in further, he slammed Pakistan from the Indian soil, saying Islamabad was making desperate attempts to cause destabilization in Afghanistan.

Visit a Success:

During his first trip to India, Muttaqi held delegation level talks with External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and interacted with Indian business leaders.

He also undertook a visit to the Taliban's ideological fountainhead Darul-uloom at Deoband in Uttar Pradesh where he received a rousing welcome, with tens of thousands of followers of the seat of moderate Islamic thought turning up to have a glimpse of his, even on the streets.

He also met representatives of Sikhs and Hindus and significantly, held two press conferences in Delhi.