The Afghan Taliban government has held talks with India on improving bilateral ties and seeking increased humanitarian assistance for the impoverished country.
Jitender Pal Singh, the Indian foreign ministry’s point-person for Afghanistan, led his delegation’s meetings with Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi and a rare interaction with Defense Minister Mohammad Yaqoob, among others, during the November 4-5 visit to Kabul.
“Yes, this was the first meeting” Yaqoob, the foreign ministry spokesperson, told a weekly news conference in New Delhi.
Jaiswal stated that “humanitarian assistance from India was the centerpiece of the meetings of JP Singh with Afghan officials.” He added that the Indian delegation also met with representatives of the United Nations agencies in Kabul.
The spokesperson discussed the visit a day after Yaqoob’s office publicly shared details of his meeting with the visiting Indian delegation.
It read that “both sides declared their common desire to enlarge the bilateral relations … and expressed their interest in further reinforcing the interactions between Afghanistan and India.”
Both sides reported that the discussions in Kabul also focused on how the Afghan business community could access the India-operated Chabahar port in Iran, which borders landlocked Afghanistan, to increase bilateral trade.
Muttaqi’s office released details of his talks with Singh, saying the Taliban chief diplomat emphasized the need to improve bilateral political and economic relations and sought better visa facilitation for Afghan businessmen to help boost trade ties with India.
The Taliban statement quoted Singh as describing New Delhi’s relations with Kabul as historic and “important for his country.” He promised to enhance Indian visa facilities for Afghans, it added.
The de facto Afghan leaders swept back to power in August 2021, when the United States and NATO troops left the country after almost two decades of war with the then-insurgent Taliban.
The Taliban takeover prompted New Delhi and Western countries to close their embassies in Kabul and mostly moved their diplomatic missions to Qatar.
No country has formally recognized the Taliban as the legitimate ruler of Afghanistan, but several neighboring and regional countries, including China, Russia, Pakistan, Iran, and Qatar, have retained their embassies. India recently reopened its diplomatic mission in Kabul, manned by low-level diplomats.
