India, China, Russia, other BRICS nations seek inclusive dialogue in Afghanistan, but avoid calling out Taliban

The grouping called for refraining from violence and settling the situation in Afghanistan by peaceful means

India on Thursday joined the other BRICS nations to call for inclusive dialogue within Afghanistan, although the five-nation-bloc that included Russia and China refrained from criticising the Taliban for keeping women and most of the ethnic communities out of the interim government it recently announced to rule the conflict-ravaged country.

The BRICS leaders, however, tacitly conveyed to the Taliban that they would expect the organisation to prevent export of terror from the territory of Afghanistan. Building on the 2020 BRICS counterterrorism strategy, the five nations agreed on an action plan to fight the menace.

“We follow with concern the latest developments in Afghanistan. We call for refraining from violence and settling the situation by peaceful means,” Prime Minister Narendra Modi, President Vladimir Putin of Russia, President Xi Jinping of China, President Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa and President Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil said in a joint declaration issued after the 13th summit of the BRICS. “We stress the need to contribute to fostering an inclusive intra-Afghan dialogue so as to ensure stability, civil peace, law and order in the country”.

Read | BRICS has adopted counter-terrorism action plan: PM Narendra Modi

This was the first plurilateral meet, which was hosted by Modi and attended by Xi after the relations between India and China hit a new low over the military stand-off that started along the disputed boundary between the two nations in eastern Ladakh in April-May 2020.

The BRICS leaders emphasised the need to address the humanitarian situation in Afghanistan and to uphold human rights, including the rights of women, children and the minorities in the country. They, however, refrained from calling out the Taliban for assault on journalists and purported atrocities on women protesting against the militant organisation’s return to power in Kabul.

They condemned the recent terrorist attacks near the Hamid Karzai Kabul International Airport that resulted in a large number of deaths and injuries. “We underscore the priority of fighting terrorism, including preventing attempts by terrorist organisations to use Afghan territory as terrorist sanctuary and to carry out attacks against other countries, as well as drug trade within Afghanistan,” Modi, Xi, Putin, Bolsonaro and Ramaphosa said in the joint statement.

The Taliban recently returned to power in Kabul after occupying many provinces in a swift military campaign taking advantage of the withdrawal of troops by the United States. The militant organisation on Tuesday announced an interim Afghan Government comprising mostly its leaders and clerics representing the Pasthtuns, leaving the other ethnic communities out.

The new dispensation also has no representation of women and is dominated by people who continue to be under United Nations sanctions. New Delhi had earlier signalled that it would want the Taliban to set up an inclusive government in Afghanistan. But the Modi Government refrained from making any comment on the structure of the new government in Kabul, even as it remains concerned over the strategic edge Pakistan would gain against India after the Taliban’s return to power in Afghanistan.

Putin utilised the BRICS summit as a forum to criticise the US for its role in Afghanistan. “People of this country have been fighting for many decades and have earned the right to independently determine what their state will be like,” the Russian President said in his opening remarks. Though Xi refrained from making any comment on Afghanistan, Beijing already indicated that it was ready to work with the Taliban Government in Kabul as long as the Taliban could ensure that the territory of Afghanistan would not be used to destabilise its Xinjiang region of China.

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