China 'Ready' To Recognize Taliban If Afghan Government Ousted
Tyler Durden's Photo
BY TYLER DURDEN
SATURDAY, AUG 14, 2021 - 05:00 PM
Late last month the world beheld the unusual footage of Taliban commanders being warmly received by China’s foreign minister Wang Yi in the Chinese city of Tianjin. That trip included the Islamic terror group's co-founder Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, in a rare visit widely seen as an attempt of the jihadists to gain "legitimacy" abroad.
It appears to have paid off, given that now at a moment the Taliban is scoring victory and victory on the ground they are eyeing the sought after price of Kabul. And now US News and World Report writes that "China is prepared to recognize the Taliban as the legitimate ruler of Afghanistan if it succeeds in toppling the Western-backed government in Kabul, U.S. News has learned, a prospect that undercuts the Biden administration's remaining source of leverage over the insurgent network as it continues its startling campaign to regain control."
But the Taliban has little incentive given it's already taken over about two-thirds of the country with relative ease and while beholding retreating national forces.
"However, new Chinese military and intelligence assessments of the realities on the ground in Afghanistan have prompted leaders in the Chinese Communist Party to prepare to formalize their relationship with the insurgent network, according to multiple U.S. and foreign intelligence sources familiar with the Chinese assessments," the report says further.
Previously the Biden administration spelled out that any future Taliban government in Afghanistan would be viewed as a "pariah state". US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said weeks ago: "The Taliban says that it seeks international recognition, that it wants international support for Afghanistan. Presumably, it wants its leaders to be able to travel freely in the world, sanctions lifted, etc," however, he underscored it would be immediately isolated, with "pariah" status akin to other 'rogue regimes'.
