Secretary of State Antony Blinken acknowledged the prospect of additional diplomatic contact with the Taliban in a speech marking the end of a dangerous evacuation effort and the withdrawal of the last U.S. forces from Afghanistan.
Going forward, any engagement with the Taliban-led government in Kabul will be driven by one thing: “our vital national interests,” Blinken said. “If we can work in the new Afghan government in a way that helps secure those interests … and in a way that brings greater stability to the country and the region, and that protects the gains of the last two decades, we will do it.”
Blinken identified the fate of Navy veteran Mark Frerichs, an American who disappeared into Taliban hands last February, as a key sign of whether President Joe Biden will see value in diplomatic relations with the Taliban following two decades of war. Yet, Blinken also acknowledged that “millions” of Afghans in the country have been forced to leave their homes, a displacement that European leaders fear will swell into a full-blown refugee crisis.
“The United States will continue to support humanitarian aid to the Afghan people,” Blinken confirmed. “Consistent with our sanctions on the Taliban, the aid will not flow through the government, but rather through independent organizations, such as U.N. agencies and [non-government organizations.] And, we expect that those efforts will not be impeded by the Taliban or anyone else.”
STATE DEPARTMENT: TALIBAN INFORMATION-SHARING DID NOT ‘EXPOSE ANYONE TO ADDITIONAL RISK’
Blinken listed a series of factors in any more fundamental diplomatic recognition of the Taliban.
“The Taliban seeks international legitimacy and support. Our message is: any legitimacy and any support will have to be earned,” he said. “The Taliban can do that by meeting commitments and obligations on freedom of travel, respecting the basic rights of the Afghan people, including women and minorities, upholding its commitments on counterterrorism, not carrying out reprisal violence against those who choose to stay in Afghanistan, and forming an inclusive government that can meet the needs and reflect the aspirations of the Afghan people.”
The evacuation effort allowed “more than 123,000 people” to escape the country, according to Blinken, who called it “an extraordinary feat of logistics and coordination under some of the most challenging circumstances imaginable.” Those circumstances included the inescapable threat of terrorist attacks against U.S. forces who had to search each person who entered the airport, exposing them to a constant risk of attacks — such as the one that killed 13 U.S. service members on Thursday.
“These deaths are a devastating loss for our country,” he said. “The most exceptional among us perform a lifetime’s worth of service in a short time here on earth. So it was for our exceptional brothers and sisters who died last week.”
The United Nations Security Council members passed a resolution earlier Monday demanding safe passage for Afghans and foreign nationals who seek to flee the country. China and Russia decided not to veto the resolution, but Moscow protested the “brain drain” likely to occur and argued the U.S. bears responsibility for the crisis rather than the Taliban.
“The country will not be able to attain the goals of sustainable development in conditions of brain drain,” Russian Ambassador to the U.N. Vasily Nebenzia said Monday, per state media. “At the same time, we see attempts to shift responsibility for the failure of the United States’s and its allies’ 20-year presence in Afghanistan on to the Taliban movement and countries of the region, which will have to face consequences of this long campaign.”
The Russian envoy, per state media, likewise protested the U.S. decision to freeze the assets of the Afghan central bank — a move taken to prevent the Taliban from walking into a $9 billion windfall. Taliban officials have also tried to blame the U.S. for the conflict, claiming there is “no proof” of al Qaeda founder Osama bin Laden’s responsibility for the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
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“While we have expectations of the Taliban, that doesn’t mean we will rely on the Taliban,” Blinken said. “We will remain vigilant in monitoring threats ourselves, and we’ll maintain robust counterterrorism capabilities in the region to neutralize those threats if necessary — as we demonstrated in the past few days, by striking ISIS facilitators and imminent threats in Afghanistan.”
