Taliban have right to decide: Leader on Imran Khan’s ‘inclusive’ call

A Taliban leader has said Pakistan or other countries have no right to issue calls for an inclusive government in Afghanistan. “Does the inclusive government mean that the neighbours have their representatives and spies in the system?” Taliban leader Mohammad Mobeen said in a TV debate on Sunday. A day earlier, Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan had tweeted that he had ‘initiated a dialogue’ with the Taliban for an inclusive Afghanistan government that will include members of the ethnic minorities of Tajiks, Hazaras and Uzbeks.

“This system is inclusive even if someone likes it or not. We have got freedom,” Pakistan’s Daily Times quoted Mobeen as saying on Afghanistan’s Ariana TV. He said, like Pakistan, the Taliban had the right to decide “our own system.”

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The Taliban are yet to make an official comment on Khan’s statement and the group’s spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid told the Times he was “collecting information” about the Pakistan prime minister’s statement.

Following a week-long offensive across Afghanistan, the Taliban overran the Afghan government and took control of Kabul on August 15, 2021. The Taliban have since sought to allay international community’s concerns regarding their rule and form of governance, promising rights to women within the confines of Islamic law and an “inclusive” government that represents Afghanistan’s complex ethnic makeup.

But, the interim 33-member Cabinet does not include even a single Hazara, even though Deputy Prime Minister Abdul Salam Hanafi is an Uzbek, and the Tajiks are represented by Chief of the Army Staff Qari Fasihuddin Makhdoom and Qari Din Mohammad Hanif. 

On Friday, while addressing the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit, Khan had asked the Taliban to fulfil their pledges to the international community including “an inclusive political structure where all ethnic groups are represented. This is vital for Afghanistan’s stability”.

He had also asked the Taliban to ensure that Afghanistan doesn’t become a safe haven for terrorists.

The SCO leaders, in a joint declaration issued at the end of the annual Summit in Tajikistan, called for an independent, democratic and peaceful Afghanistan, that is free of terrorism, war and drugs.