We must hold a firm line with the Taliban

Jessica Ludwig

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International consensus against recognizing the Taliban is fraying at a startling speed.

Resolve to stand up to the Taliban will again be put to the test at the United Nations’ third Doha Meeting on Afghanistan on June 30 – July 1. At the time of writing, the Taliban accepted an invitation to attend the meeting to discuss the country’s future. Afghan women’s advocates and civil society representatives will be noticeably excluded from the in-person sessions. With a meeting agenda narrowly tailored to the Taliban’s preferences and limited to private sector development and counternarcotics, how will they be held accountable for their actions? Ongoing security concerns, the Taliban’s handling of humanitarian crises, and gross human rights violations – especially the systematic persecution of women – reflect a high level of instability in Afghanistan under the Taliban that hardly justifies normalizing their capture of the country.

Against this backdrop, the United States and the international community must take a hard look at their roles in contributing to the Taliban’s pursuit of legitimacy.

This should start with rejecting some exemptions to the travel ban and asset freezes sanctioned Taliban leaders have submitted to the U.N. Security Council. The United States has voted to approve every single travel ban exemption request, Thomas West, the State Department’s Special Envoy for Afghanistan, testified at a January 2024 congressional hearing.

Instead of allowing Taliban members to travel, the United States and the international community should be ratcheting up pressure on the Taliban leadership by considering targeted sanctions, designations, and other measures to hold them responsible for human rights abuses, corruption, and ongoing links to terrorist groups.

Taliban acting Interior Minister Sirajuddin Haqqani and three other sanctioned senior Taliban leaders were in Saudi Arabia this month for the Hajj, the Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca, thanks to travel ban exemptions granted by the Security Council. But this was no ordinary religious act for Haqqani and his colleagues. It was a propaganda coup with implications for Haqqani’s internal status within the Taliban and the Taliban’s standing within the world.