After ending the 20-year US war, President Joe Biden hopes
the US’ economic might can serve as leverage on the Taliban to shape the new
Afghanistan. But experts question how much the triumphant Islamists can be
swayed.
اضافة اعلان
Since their stunningly swift t
akeover of Afghanistan in
August, the Taliban leadership has sought a rebranding from the notorious
zealotry of the 1996–2001 regime and voiced hope for a stable relationship with
the United States.
Likely
underlying the Taliban's stance is the harsh reality
that they must now run one of the world's poorest countries, where foreign assistance
led by the United States accounted for 75 percent of public expenditure in
2019.
Since the former insurgents took control of the capital
Kabul on August 15, Western nations have stopped direct payments and the United
States has frozen nearly $9.5 billion in central bank assets.
In an address Tuesday to mark the end of the US’ longest
war, Biden promised to exert "leverage" on the Taliban including
through "diplomacy, economic tool's and rallying the rest of the
world."
His national security advisor, Jake Sullivan, in an ABC
interview did not reject eventually sending aid to a Taliban government,
saying: "We are going to wait and see by their actions."
His national security advisor, Jake Sullivan, in an ABC
interview did not reject eventually sending aid to a Taliban government,
saying: "We are going to wait and see by their actions."
Biden painted a coldly pragmatic view of US interests in
Afghanistan — getting out remaining Americans and making sure it is not a base
for international attacks, the original reason the United States toppled the
first Taliban regime after the September 11 attacks.
This time round, US officials were pleasantly surprised at
the Taliban's level of cooperation in the final days on letting out US citizens
and many Afghan allies.
But both officials and experts say the jury is out on
Taliban 2.0.
Common enemy in Daesh
Elizabeth Threlkeld, a senior fellow at the Stimson Center
and former US diplomat, said the Taliban had its own revenue stream including
through narcotics, smuggling, and their own customs and taxation.
But on international aid, "there's only so much that
they are going to be able to do without a continuation of those funds,"
she said.
The Taliban have shown a willingness to work with the United
States against Daesh, its rival, but would face a "harder sell"
internally on issues core to their ideology such as treatment of women, whose
rights were severely curtailed during the former regime, Threlkeld said.
"I think the pragmatic course going forward is maybe to
distrust and verify," Threlkeld said.
"Even though it's far from an ideal option," she
said of cooperating against Daesh, "that could be one area where we can
start and we can test the waters."
Graeme Smith, a consultant at the International Crisis
Group, said the United States needed to be aware it will not get all it wants.
"Western diplomats are obsessed with leverage. I think
that's the wrong way to think about it. We lost the war. Full stop," he
said.
"So whatever we seek to achieve now in Afghanistan will
be from a place of humility, and from a place of give and take. This will be
about bargaining and not about coercion."
'North Korea of South Asia'?
Smith said that Afghanistan could be in a far more
precarious position if the United States had not already been in dialogue with
the insurgents — who knew the US priorities.
"The Taliban are not eager to be an American proxy. But
they're also keen to avoid the kind of provocation that resulted in the
collapse of their last government," he said.
The group could still form a government that is sufficiently
palatable to the West on rights and includes figures from the former
internationally-backed government in Kabul.
"If it does that, then I think there is a chance that a
Taliban government could avoid becoming the sort of North Korea of South
Asia," he said.
Michael Kugelman, a South Asia expert at the Woodrow Wilson
International Center for Scholars, said the Taliban and the United States could
both find common cause in coordinating narrowly to push through humanitarian
assistance for Afghans.
"Economic assistance is the only arrow left in
Washington's quiver," he said.
But any conditioning of non-humanitarian aid faces a giant
potential obstacle — China, which has made clear it is ready to do business
with the Taliban as it seeks Afghanistan's mineral wealth.
"Beijing doesn't need assurances from the Taliban on
human rights. As long as it gets security assurances, it's likely to offer recognition,"
Kugelman said.
"The US will have to be very practical about what it
can achieve in Afghanistan, and keep expectations low."
Read more Opinion and Analysis
.jpg)
.jpg)
