I think you know me from other forum and how I would get lambasted and get accused of being a apologist for the Afghans. You can see I was correct in my stance. I always said the choicve for Pakistan was limited to -
- integrate and develop trading order to the east - in other words India.
- integrate to the west and develop Afghanistan as a hub to connect with Central Asia, Eurasia and Iran.
Of course I favoured the west. PMIK already discussed a rail line between Pakistan-Afghanistan-Uzbekistan. If touch wood the Taliban learn to play realpolitiks we could within the decade have Central Asia within 2 hours drive from Pakistan. Imagine the trade potential. Gwadar could become the port to service all of Central Asia, Afghanistan, Chinese Turkestan. The possibilities are unlimited. Gas and oil flowing into Pakistan from Central Asia etc.
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Pakistan is working closely with Turkey, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan etc to have a common policy with regards to Taliban. Recognition will follow after regional countries all agree - you can safely exclude India from this.
"Prime Minister Imran Khan held talks over telephone with the Turkish president (Recep Tayyip Erdogan) on Monday while Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi received a call from his US counterpart Antony Blinken."
Turkey is in talks with Taliban so let's hope something positive comes out. Thus far Taliban are behaving quite unlike 1996 so this makes me optimistic. I believe PM IK has told them to moderate and refine their policies but they can still retain their belief system but make it more acceptable in the modern world.