WASHINGTON: Among a few ambassadors who remain in Kabul, Wang Yu, the Chinese ambassador to Afghanistan, appears the busiest.
According to Voice of America, this week, Wang met with three Taliban ministers, two of whom are particularly shunned by Western diplomats — Sirajuddin Haqqani, the interior minister, who has a $10 million bounty over his head from the United States, and Nida Mohammad Nadem, the higher education minister who has closed universities for Afghan girls.
Like his counterpart in Kabul, Sayed Muhayuddin Sadaat, the Taliban’s ambassador in Beijing, maintains a busy meeting nationwide with the Chinese government and corporate officials.
China is among a few countries that host a Taliban charge d’affaires. Short of formal recognition, Beijing has practically treated the Taliban regime as Afghanistan’s legitimate government and a trade, investment and security partner.
“A crucial driving factor behind China’s shift lies in its preference for political systems that guarantee longer-term predictability in bilateral relationships, even if led by Islamist groups like the Taliban,” Javid Ahmad, a former Afghan ambassador, told VOA.
“The Chinese leaders operate under the assumption that their success in the competition with the West hinges on their leverage over smaller intermediary states like Afghanistan.”
3-3 policy
While sharing a rugged and permanently closed 92-kilometre-long border with Afghanistan, China has traditionally treated the country distantly, saying it follows a policy of “3 Respects” and “3 Nevers.”
“China respects the independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity of Kabul, respects the independent choices made by the Afghan citizens, and respects the religious beliefs and national customs of Afghanistan,” reads a policy statement issued by China’s foreign ministry on April 12.
Perhaps it is out of that respect that China has failed to take any punitive action against the Taliban, which, according to the United Nations and other independent human rights groups, has imposed a nationwide gender-apartheid regime denying women the most basic human rights.
“China never interferes in Afghanistan’s internal matters, never seeks selfish interests in Afghanistan, and never pursues so-called sphere of influence,” the policy statement continues.
Lithium deposits
Around the world, Beijing has been accused of maintaining a highly exploitative policy toward low-income countries in Asia and Africa, where Chinese companies have invested in mine extraction and large construction projects.
After signing an oil extraction contract with a Chinese firm earlier this year, Taliban officials say China is interested in investing in lithium mining in Afghanistan.
Landlocked Afghanistan reportedly has more than $1 trillion worth of precious minerals, including the highly sought-after lithium deposits in rechargeable batteries.
“Part and parcel of the way they [China] approach a bilateral relationship are extractive, literally and figuratively extractive, looking for advantages that they can take from a bilateral relationship, including the potential for critical minerals,” John Kirby, spokesperson for the U.S. National Security Council, told reporters Wednesday in response to a VOA question about recent rapprochements in China-Taliban relations.
Chinese interests in Afghanistan’s natural resources are not new, as it signed a multibillion-dollar copper mining contract with the former Afghan government in 2007, though the project never started.
The recent oil deal signed with the Taliban “is the same one CNPC [China National Petroleum Corporation] reached back in 2011. The regime asked the Chinese to sign a new deal, or the project would not be allowed to continue,” Yun Sun, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Stimson Center, told VOA.
She said that China is still concerned about instability in Afghanistan and is unlikely to invest in mining there soon.
