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Central Asia Has Learned to Live With the Taliban
['Giorgio Cafiero', 'Elliot Waldman', 'Frida Ghitis', 'James Bosworth', 'Paul Poast', 'Judah Grunstein', 'Charli Carpenter', 'Ulrike Franke', 'Mary Gallagher', 'Candace Rondeaux']
World Politics Review
Share this article:XBlueskyFacebookGet Article LinkWhen the Taliban reclaimed control of Afghanistan in 2021, none of its Central Asian neighbors welcomed the group’s return to power, and none have formally recognized it since then.
As a result, over the past five years, all five Central Asian states have to varying degrees adapted to Taliban rule in Afghanistan and advanced their national interests through relations with the Islamic Emirate that are normalized in all but name.
Of them, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, which share borders with Afghanistan, have gone the farthest toward normalization of diplomatic and economic ties.
Tajikistan—also an immediate neighbor—has remained the most skeptical, though it has still joined the regional trend of establishing working relations with the Taliban.
But for all the states in the region, the militant group’s return to power in Afghanistan has created complex realities that they are now forced to navigate.