India’s Taliban gambit exposes Pakistan’s Afghanistan strategy

IN EARLY JANUARY, India’s foreign secretary, Vikram Misri, met Amir Khan Muttaqi, the acting foreign minister of Afghanistan’s Taliban government, in Dubai. This was the highest level of engagement between Kabul and New Delhi since August 2021, when the Taliban overthrew Afghanistan’s republican government and returned to power. The meeting was also a diplomatic setback for Pakistan. 

Afghanistan has always been of geopolitical importance to Pakistan, providing it “strategic depth” in case of military attack by India. This was why Pakistan invested in and cultivated the Taliban for decades, long before the United States-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001. India never had a similar reason to develop ties with the Taliban, which it considered to be a Pakistan proxy in Afghanistan.