India's next round of talks with Taliban may take place in a week

File Image. The Taliban delegation arrives for Afghan peace talks in Doha, Qatar, Thursday, August 12, 2021. (AP Photo/Hussein Sayed)

After making its first contact with the Taliban on Tuesday, India is preparing to engage again with the Islamic group that gained control of Afghanistan earlier in August, people familiar with the situation said. The talks may take place as early as next week, they said.

At the first meeting, India's Ambassador to Qatar Deepak Mittal sat down with Sher Mohammad Abbas Stanekzai, head of the Taliban’s Political Office, in Doha. The meeting took place at the Indian embassy at the request of the Taliban, the ministry of external affairs said.

Doha, the Qatar capital where the Taliban maintain a permanent presence and all negotiations that led to the US troop withdrawal from Afghanistan have taken place, is set to be the venue of the next round of talks as well.

The evacuation of Afghan Sikhs and Hindus still left in the war-torn country and the future of unfinished infrastructure and development projects that were being built by India may be discussed, the people cited in the first instance said, requesting anonymity.

Major finished & committed infrastructure and development projects by India in Afghanistan

Unfinished projects

"The Taliban remain keen on discussing the fate of the projects since they are crucial in helping them stabilise and govern the country. The government is considering what decision to take regarding them," one of the people, a government official, said.

As an illustration of the Taliban’s intention to have the projects completed, after initial reports of attacks near key power and water infrastructure by the Islamic group, it has left unharmed Indian-built public works as it struggles to establish order in Afghanistan.

According to New Delhi, in the past 20 years, India has pledged and implemented reconstruction projects worth more than $3 billion in Afghanistan. In 2020, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said no part of Afghanistan had been left “untouched” by the “400-plus projects” that India has undertaken in all 34 provinces of the country.

The big projects that have been completed include the Salma Dam in Herat Province, the Delaram-Zaranj highway in Southern Afghanistan, and the country’s new Parliament building, which has a wing named after late former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. Many other projects are in various stages of completion.

The Taliban have not publicly said so, but may insist on the completion of the projects in return for not letting Afghanistan be used by anti-India Islamist groups such as the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM), and Harkat-ul-Jihad al-Islami (HuJI), the people with knowledge of the situation said.

“We will not allow any country or any group to use the soil of Afghanistan against anyone. This is clear. India has made projects, many reconstruction and infrastructure projects, and if they want, they can complete the incomplete projects because they are for the people," a Taliban spokesperson told a Pakistani TV Channel on August 18.

Remaining evacuation

Local news reports suggest that about 100 members of the Afghan Sikh and Hindu communities wishing to travel to India may still be stuck in Afghanistan. Moneycontrol had earlier reported how New Delhi's evacuation efforts had to end by August 28 before the international air bridge and evacuation operation being run by the US ended on August 31.

This was because the US had been expected to prioritise the removal of its own troops and military assets from Afghanistan in the last three days, MEA officials said. The US brought out more than 6,000 troops and military assets that were based in the airport and stationed in parts of Kabul province until the end.

The Indian government has also received reports of Afghans being stopped from seeking refugee status in India. It is not yet clear whether this topic will be a part of the next round of discussions with the Taliban.

For regular Afghan citizens, the government introduced a new electronic visa category called the e-Emergency X-Misc Visa, which has to be applied for online and will be valid for six months. The applications are being processed by a special cell for Afghanistan operating 24x7 in the Ministry of External Affairs in New Delhi. The visa will be provided on a discretionary basis.

On August 25, India cancelled all visas issued to Afghans who are currently not in India with immediate effect. The MEA said all Afghan nationals must travel to India only on the X-Misc visa. Many refugees have complained that it is an arduous process, made even tougher by the fact that mobile and internet connectivity in Kabul remains spotty at best.