Chakar The Great
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- Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen says the group welcomes Chinese investments in reconstruction and would guarantee the safety of investors and workers
- The US withdrawal from Afghanistan has emboldened the Taliban and there are growing concerns about the Kabul government’s ability to stay in power
Amy Chew
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Published: 7:00am, 9 Jul, 2021
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Afghan National Army officers keeps watch at a checkpoint in Kabul, Afghanistan. Photo: Reuters
The Taliban sees China as a “friend” to Afghanistan and is hoping to talk to Beijing about investing in reconstruction work “as soon as possible”, the group’s spokesman Suhail Shaheen said on Wednesday.
In an exclusive interview with This Week in Asia, Suhail said the Taliban now controlled 85 per cent of the country and that it would guarantee the safety of Chinese investors and workers if they were to return.
“We welcome them. If they have investments of course we ensure their safety. Their safety is very important for us,” he said by phone.Suhail also said the Taliban would no longer allow China’s Uyghur separatist fighters, some of whom had previously sought refuge in Afghanistan, to enter the country. The Taliban would also prevent al-Qaeda or any other
terrorist group from operating there.
The interview comes as the Taliban advances in Afghanistan’s northern provinces following the near complete withdrawal of US troops from the country. US intelligence agencies believe the government in Kabul is now likely to collapse within six months of the withdrawal, allowing the Taliban back into power 20 years after it was overthrown.
Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen. Photo: Handout
The US invaded the country after the September 11, 2001 attacks carried out by al-Qaeda in New York and Washington, claiming the Taliban had been sheltering the terrorist group.
Suhail said following the departure of US troops it was “necessary [to] hold talks” with China, the biggest investor in Afghanistan.
“We have been to China many times and we have good relations with them,” Suhail said. “China is a friendly country that we welcome for reconstruction and developing Afghanistan.”
If [the Chinese] have investments of course we ensure their safetySuhail Shaheen, Taliban spokesman
Afghanistan has the world’s largest unexploited reserves of copper, coal, iron, gas, cobalt, mercury, gold, lithium and thorium, valued at over US$1 trillion.
In 2011, the China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) won a US$400 million bid to drill three oil fields for 25 years, containing roughly 87 million barrels of oil.
Chinese firms have also gained rights to mine copper at Mes Aynak in Logar province, some 40km southeast of Afghanistan’s capital, Kabul.
Committed to Doha deal
China blames a separatist Uygur group that it refers to as the East Turkestan
Islamic Movement
(ETIM) for terrorist acts in its restive western province of
Xinjiang
.
While some experts have cast doubt on whether a group with that name exists, it is widely accepted that in the 1990s some Uygurs left China for Afghanistan with the intention of establishing a guerilla insurgency. The US removed ETIM from its list of terrorist organisations last year, drawing the ire of China.
“People from other countries who want to use Afghanistan as a site [to launch attacks] against other countries, we have made a commitment that we will not allow them in whether it’s an individual or entity against any country including China,” said Suhail.
US troops leave Afghanistan’s Bagram airbase without notifying new Afghan commander
US troops leave Afghanistan’s Bagram airbase without notifying new Afghan commander
“This is our commitment in the Doha agreement. We are abiding by that agreement,” said Suhail, referring to the peace deal the group signed with the
United States
in February 2020 in Doha that paved the way for the withdrawal.
Asked specifically whether this commitment included the ETIM, he said: “Yes, it will not be allowed in”.
Suhail also said al-Qaeda belonged to a “past era” and would not be allowed to operate in the country any more.
He said the Taliban had “inherited al-Qaeda” from the former government of President Burhanuddin Rabbani when al-Qaeda swept into Afghanistan in the nineties. The Taliban overthrew Rabbani’s government in 1996.
“We allowed [al-Qaeda] to stay in Afghanistan because they had no place in any other country.”
But he claimed there were now no longer any al-Qaeda members in Afghanistan and insisted that under the Doha peace deal the Taliban had “committed ourselves that we will not allow” any individual, group or entity to use Afghanistan to carry out attacks against the US, its allies or “any other country in the world”.
“We will not permit any open recruitment or any training or fundraising centre for any group in Afghanistan,” said Suhail. “If there is one who is hiding and we find them, we will tell them they cannot [stay].”
Armed men who are opposed to the Taliban’s return at a check post in the Ghorband District, Parwan Province, Afghanistan. Photo: Reuters
A longstanding relationship
Andrew Small, a senior transatlantic fellow with the German Marshall Fund’s Asia Programme, said China’s relationship with the Taliban was “longstanding”, going back to the group’s time in government. The Taliban ruled the country from 1996 to 2001.
“I first wrote about it many years back when I became aware of the secret meetings that had been taking place in Pakistan even after the US invasion and before other countries’ contacts with the Taliban had been normalised,” said Small.
China had in one sense been a “friend” by maintaining diplomatic contacts with the Taliban, he said.
However, he said that now China would “be very cautious about any new investments or commitments to Afghanistan”.
“Whatever benign language the Taliban use, China remains highly concerned about the security situation there,” said Small.
He said China’s biggest concern in its dealings with the Taliban had always been whether it was sheltering Uygur separatists.
Whatever benign language the Taliban use, China remains highly concerned about the security situation thereAndrew Small, German Marshall Fund’s Asia Programme
In the late 1990s, Beijing worried that the Taliban government was providing a haven for Uygur militants who had fled Chinese crackdowns in Xinjiang and set up training camps in Afghanistan.
An understanding between China and the Taliban on the Uygur issue dated back to Beijing’s exchanges with Mullah Omar, the late leader of the Taliban who died in 2013, said Small.
“How strictly the Taliban are willing or capable of enforcing this understanding is a separate question though – there have always been doubts about that on Beijing’s part, which is one of the many reasons why, even though they have reached these agreements with the Taliban, there is a lot of trepidation about them on China’s part,” said Small.
Beijing was also concerned about security risks spilling over into its own territory because Afghanistan shares a 90km border with
Xinjiang
.
On Thursday, China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi said the problems in Afghanistan were practical challenges facing both China and
Pakistan
.
“China, along with Pakistan, is willing to continue support for all parties in Afghanistan to seek a political solution through dialogue that leads to ethnic reconciliation and long-lasting peace,” Wang said.
An Afghan National Army soldier stands guard at the gate of Bagram US air base, on the day the last American troops vacated it. Photo: Reuters
The US last weekend abandoned Bagram air base, the longtime staging ground for its military operations in the country, effectively ending America’s longest war. The Pentagon says the withdrawal of US forces is 90 per cent complete.Afghan government forces, no longer backed by US-led Nato troops, have shown signs of collapsing, with soldiers abandoning their posts, and have often had to retreat, at times into neighbouring countries like Tajikistan.Washington agreed to withdraw in a deal negotiated last year under President Joe Biden’spredecessor, Donald Trump.
Biden overruled military leaders who wanted to keep a larger presence to assist Afghan security forces and prevent Afghanistan from becoming a staging ground for extremist groups. In April, he ordered all US forces to withdraw by September 11, the 20th anniversary of the al-Qaeda attacks.
The commander of US troops in Afghanistan, General Austin Miller, warned last week that the country may be headed towards a civil war.
01:52
China tells its nationals to leave Afghanistan as violence spirals ahead of US withdrawal
China tells its nationals to leave Afghanistan as violence spirals ahead of US withdrawal
The US intelligence community believes the Afghan military is weak and that the Kabul government’s prospects for survival in the short term are not good. But the idea of the Taliban in power has also stoked fears among women that they will once again be oppressed, stopped from working and that young girls will be banned from going to school. Rights groups said Taliban insurgents had forced people out of their homes in northern areas that they had captured and have expressed concern for the safety of women.
Suhail claimed girls would be allowed in classrooms.
“In the districts that we control, schools are open and girls are allowed to attend,” he said.
He also appealed to the international community for financial assistance to help pay teachers, civil servants and local officials.
“The Kabul government has stopped paying their salaries ... in the areas that we control,” he said.
