The Taliban will attend China’s Belt and Road Forum next week, a spokesman said on Saturday, underscoring Beijing’s growing official ties with the administration, despite its lack of formal recognition by any government.
Taliban officials and ministers have at times travelled to regional meetings, mostly those focussed on Afghanistan, but the Belt and Road Forum is among the highest-profile multilateral summits it has been invited to attend.
The forum in Beijing on Tuesday and Wednesday marks the 10th anniversary of President Xi Jinping’s ambitious global infrastructure and energy initiative, billed as recreating the ancient Silk Road to boost global trade.
Sure, but you’re also ignoring rural ethnic groups like the Tajiks and the Hazaras that are certainly not happy with Taliban rule. The Taliban are a Pashtun movement and are not all that friendly to many other ethnic groups in Afghanistan, especially in the north.
Yes, the north was a hold out for a long while.