The waiver of the travel ban on senior Taliban officials by the United Nations ended four months ago. The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) had previously held a meeting regarding the exemption of the travel ban on 13 Taliban officials. The meeting ended without announcing the result. After that, the UN Security Council has not taken a new decision regarding the imposition of sanctions on Taliban officials, and the deadline for their travel exemption has not been extended. In the latest case, two members of the Taliban leadership traveled to the United Arab Emirates and met with the ruler of this country. A number of citizens and politicians criticize the UAE government officials and ask why this country does not respect the decisions of the United Nations Security Council. However, experts call the United Arab Emirates’ move to host Taliban leaders as a competition between the country and Qatar. This is despite the fact that some time ago, Taliban leaders criticized the non-extension of the travel ban exemption for their members.
Mullah Muhammad Yaqoub Mujahid, the Taliban’s Acting Defense Minister, traveled to the United Arab Emirates on Saturday while the deadline for exemption from the ban on the travel of Taliban officials by the United Nations Security Council has ended. Zabihullah Mujahid, a Taliban spokesperson, tweeted that the purpose of Mullah Mohammad Yaqoub’s trip was to “strengthen ties between the two countries and solve the problems of Afghans living in that country”. However, experts say that his trip is aimed at negotiating the establishment of an all-inclusive government and bringing the Taliban closer to the United Arab Emirates. According to them, while this country has not recognized the Taliban, it has entered the field in competition with Qatar and wants to increase its influence among the Taliban.
Anas Haqqani, one of the leading members of the Haqqani network, has accompanied the Taliban’s Acting Defense Minister to the United Arab Emirates. The images that have been published of their meetings with a bunch of Afghan citizens living in the UAE, show that both of them are present at the same meeting.
Mullah Muhammad Yaqoub Mujahid, the Taliban’s Acting Defense Minister, and Anas Haqqani, a member of the Taliban leadership, are traveling to the United Arab Emirates, while their foreign travel exemption expired about four months ago, and after that the United Nations Security Council has not decided on this matter.
However, the diplomats at the United Nations General Assembly told Hasht-e Subh that there has been no change regarding the extension of the travel ban of 13 senior members of the Taliban. According to them, no new decision has been taken by the UN Security Council in this regard.
Regarding the exemption from the 10-day travel ban of Mullah Khairullah Khairkhah, acting Minister of Information and Culture of the Taliban to Russia, these diplomats say that this action was taken at the request of Russia in the Security Council and this council only issued a 10-day travel exemption for him. These sources emphasize that no decision has been made regarding the trip of Mullah Yaqoob, the Taliban’s Acting Minister of Defense. They suggest that the United Arab Emirates, as a member of the United Nations Security Council, has made an agreement with this council that has not been made public so far.
Mullah Khairullah Khairkhah, Acting Minister of Information and Culture of the Taliban, has obtained a ten-day travel exemption for participating in the 50th anniversary of the Convention on the Protection of World Cultural Heritage. This is despite the fact that in the 1990s, the Taliban destroyed the Buddha statues in Bamiyan, a world cultural heritage in Afghanistan. The Buddha statue of Bamiyan was destroyed by this group and also part of the statues in the national archive of the country were destroyed.
However, experts suggest that Anas Haqqani, one of the leading members of the Haqqani network, is not on the UN Security Council’s sanctions list.
What Do Political Experts Suggest About Foreign Trips of Taliban Officials?
The member states of the United Nations are responsible for following the decisions of the Security Council. According to experts, interaction with the Taliban and the foreign trips of their officials are considered part of international security, and any kind of dialogue with this group outside the mechanisms of this council is indirect support for the Taliban and abandoning the people of Afghanistan.
According to political experts, while the United Arab Emirates (UAE) is one of the key supporters of the Taliban in the last two decades, it has less respect for the Taliban than Qatar, and therefore tries to increase its influence through interaction.
“Just as Afghanistan is the geography of proxy wars, the Taliban is an organization that promotes the will of different groups, rivals and enemies,” Dr. Zakir Hossain Ershad, a professor at the University of București, Romania, told Hasht-e Subh. “There are multiple and contradictory capacities in the structure of this group, and everyone interacts with the Taliban through that,” he added.
“The interaction with the Taliban, as of yet, is more political than legal,” Mr. Ershad said. “All foreign actors involved in the affairs of Afghanistan, determine their relationship with the Taliban, based on political interests of the actors rather than legal and formal approvals. No country is exempt from this rule, from America to the smallest actor, they regulate their relationship with the Taliban more with realistic rules,” Dr. Ershad detailed.
“The Taliban are a good regional tool to pursue the interests of the powers and use against their rivals,” said Dr. Ershad. “Countries are trying to use the Taliban for their own benefit,” he added.
“It seems that the United Arab Emirates has invited Mullah Yaqoub in coordination with the United States and its European allies,” says journalist Ferdaws Kawish. “Because the United Arab Emirates would not have done this without coordination with its allies.”
From a diplomatic and security point of view, the level of ties between the United Arab Emirates and the United States is very important, therefore, it is not possible that Mullah Yaqoub was invited and accepted in the UAE without coordination with America, according to Mr. Kawish.
According to this journalist, the policy of the United States for now is minimal engagement with the Taliban. Previously, Mullah Mohammad Yaqoub had also traveled to Qatar and it seems that this trip was coordinated with America there.
The History of Travel Ban on Taliban Officials
In 2011, the United Nations Security Council, in a special resolution, banned 135 members of the Taliban from traveling abroad. In addition to the travel ban, UNSC also imposed more extensive sanctions such as asset freeze. With the start of peace negotiations in 2018, the United States of America lifted the travel ban on 15 of the group’s leaders, and in 2019, the United Nations Security Council lifted the travel ban on 14 members of the Taliban in order to participate in peace talks.
Western members of the council, including the United States, said the Taliban had widely violated women’s rights and failed to fulfill their promises to establish an inclusive government in Afghanistan, and therefore the travel exemption for senior members of the group should not be extended. However, the representatives of Russia and China emphasized that the travel exemption of 13 senior Taliban officials should be extended. At the end of this meeting, it ended without any results and so far no new decision has been made regarding the exemption of foreign travel of the senior officials of the Taliban.
Which Taliban Leaders Are Subject to Travel Bans?
The United Nations Security Council has included the names of 135 senior members of the Taliban and several institutions affiliated with this group in its blacklist. The name of Mullah Hibatullah Akhundzada, Taliban leader, does not appear in this list. The United Nations sanctions against the Taliban leadership include confiscation of assets, travel ban, and arms trade ban. During the Doha peace talks, the travel exemption for 13 of them was temporarily removed.
According to the UNSC’s latest list of exemptions for the travel ban on Taliban officials, Abdul Ghani Baradar, Deputy Prime Minister for Economy, Abdul Salam Hanafi, Deputy Prime Minister for Administration, Foreign Minister, Amir Khan Mutaqqi, Minister of Mines, Shahabuddin Delawar, Intelligence Director, Abdul Haq Wasiq, Khairullah Khairkhah, the Minister of Information and Culture, Din Mohammad Hanif, the Taliban’s Vice and Virtue Minister, Abdul Latif Mansour, and other prominent figures in its ranks have been included.
The Taliban’s Reaction to the Non-extension of Waiving the Travel Ban
The Taliban have called the non-extension of the exemption from the travel ban of its leadership members as creating distance and said that the “policy of isolation” will not work. Bilal Karimi, deputy spokesman of the Taliban, has said in a conversation with some local media outlets that their regime is trying to remove the gap between the so-called Islamic Emarat of Afghanistan and the world. Because according to him, the policy of “isolation” has not had a positive impact.
Mullah Yaqoub and Anas Haqqani have visited the United Arab Emirates while it is said that an important meeting will be held in this country. Hamid Karzai, the former president of the country, has also visited the United Arab Emirates. Since the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, he was banned from leaving the country and was under apparent house detention for the past 15 months. He has recently received permission to travel abroad. Hamid Karzai, who is now in the United Arab Emirates, is going to go to Germany. But he did not explain the reason for his trip to the United Arab Emirates and Germany. A number of sources say that he will meet Mullah Yaqoub and Anas Haqqani in the UAE during this trip. According to sources, these officials will meet to vote on the creation of an inclusive government. So far, none of the parties have officially expressed their opinions in this regard. Before this, the representatives of western countries and Afghanistan’s neighbors have repeatedly emphasized the establishment of an inclusive government in the country. However, the Taliban have not given a positive response to this demand.