ISLAMABAD (AP) — The Taliban on Sunday ordered the West to look past the measures they have imposed on Afghan women and girls to improve foreign relations.
Their main spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid said the Taliban uphold certain religious and cultural values and public aspirations that “must be recognized” to facilitate progressive bilateral relations rather than face disputes and stagnation.
Mujahid made his request on the opening day of a United Nations-led meeting in Qatar to increase engagement in Afghanistan and bring about a more coordinated approach to the country’s problems.
It is the third UN-sponsored meeting in Doha. The Taliban were not invited to the first meeting, and UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said they were setting unacceptable conditions to attend the second meeting in February, which demanded that members of Afghan civil society be excluded from the talks and that the Taliban be treated as the country’s legitimate rulers.
Afghan women are excluded of the current meeting in Doha.
No country officially recognizes the Taliban and the UN has said recognition remains virtually impossible, while ban on women’s education and employment to stay.
But Mujahid struck a defiant tone on Sunday, saying political understanding between the Taliban and other nations has been disrupted improved steadily.
He said Kazakhstan had removed the Taliban from the list of banned groups and that Russia would take a similar measure in the near future. Mujahid, who is meeting special envoys on the sidelines, earlier said Saudi Arabia had expressed its intention to reopen the embassy in Kabul.
Relations with regional countries have shown that the Taliban have the commitment and ability to establish and maintain relations, Mujahid said in his remarks.
“I do not deny that some countries may have problems with some of the measures of the Islamic Emirate,” Mujahid said in his speech. “I think policy differences between states are natural, and it is the duty of experienced diplomats to find ways for interaction and understanding rather than confrontation.”
Such differences should not become so great that powerful countries would use their influence to exert security, political and economic pressure that would affect Afghanistan in a significant way. He mentioned the harsh edicts about women and girls who have sparked global outrage, but has previously referred to them as an “internal affair.” The Taliban has rejected criticism of their treatment of Afghan women and girls, call it interference.
“Therefore, other countries, especially Western countries, can remove the obstacles that hinder the development of relations with the Afghan government,” Mujahid said.
The decision to exclude Afghan women from the meeting has drawn criticism from rights groups, the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in Afghanistan Richard Bennettand Nobel Prize winner Malala Yousufzai.
Yousufzaiwho was shot by a Taliban gunman for campaigning for girls’ education, wrote on the social media platform X last Thursday that she had spoken to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres about the meeting in Doha.
She said she was “alarmed and disappointed” that the Taliban had been invited to meet with UN special envoys while Afghan women and human rights defenders were excluded from the main discussion.
Holding the meeting without Afghan women present sent “completely wrong” signals that the world was ready to give in to the Taliban’s demands.
She added that what the Taliban did in Afghanistan amounted to gender apartheid.
Previously the United Nations’ Afghanistan’s top official, Roza Otunbayeva, defended the fact that Afghan women were not included in the Doha meeting. She emphasized that demands for women’s rights will certainly be addressed.
