According to Husain Haqqani, a former Pakistani ambassador to Washington, the two countries want to maintain stable relations. Despite its interests in both countries, it is hard for China to get involved in the dispute. India provides Afghanistan with development aid, but cannot be considered a partner of the Taliban.
Rome (AsiaNews) – Husain Haqqani, Pakistan's former ambassador to the United States, does not believe Islamabad and Kabul are heading towards open war.
In his view, “tensions and skirmishes will increase. However, at the end of the day, the Taliban need the Pakistani state’s support and the Pakistani establishment views the Taliban as preferable to any other Afghan government.”
Other analysts and observers believe, however, a conflict to be inevitable, given that Pakistan could not defeat the Taliban guerrillas within its borders without fighting their "big brothers" in Afghanistan.
Tensions between the two countries rose last month after cross-border shelling left several people dead and wounded at the Chaman border crossing.
As for options available to counter Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, the Pakistani government issued a statement on 2 January that was a clear reference to its Afghan neighbour.
“No country,” it read, “will be allowed to provide sanctuaries and facilitation to terrorists and Pakistan reserves all rights in that respect to safeguard her people”.
The Afghan Taliban emerged thanks to Pakistani support, but as Haqqani explains, the differences between the two sides go back a long way, and were evident even in the 1990s, when the Islamist group was on the rise in Afghanistan.
“No Afghan regime – whether Taliban or other – has ever recognised the border between the two countries as the international boundary. Further, the Taliban have never abandoned their ideological beliefs and that includes supporting groups like the Pakistani Taliban," Haqqani told AsiaNews.
Fighting between Pakistan and Afghanistan would lead to unpredictable geopolitical scenarios in a region already marked by instability, with strong repercussions for the geopolitical competition between India and China.
China has consolidated political and economic relations with Pakistan, and a Chinese firm just signed a contract with Afghanistan's Taliban government to drill for oil in the country, the first major foreign investment in Afghanistan since the Taliban came back to power in August 2021.
On paper, the Chinese are best positioned to play a brokering role between the two countries divided along the Durand Line, the disputed border between Pakistan and Afghanistan.
“China has long depended upon the Pakistani state’s sureties that Islamabad can deliver in Afghanistan,” Haqqani notes. China is carefully monitoring how Pakistan meets challenges in Afghanistan and how the Taliban are unable to deal with the Islamic State-Khorasan Province (IS-KP), the Afghan affiliate of the Islamic State.
For the former diplomat, who is currently Senior Fellow and Director for South and Central Asia at the Hudson Institute, “While China prefers an Afghanistan where Pakistan – not the US or India – is in control, China may not see the benefit of inserting itself into what is primarily a Pakistan-Afghanistan issue.”
India is also involved in the confrontation between Pakistan and Afghanistan. The Taliban government has asked India to continue providing development assistance, Haqqani notes. In both Kabul and Islamabad, they know that the Indians can deliver, while the Pakistanis cannot.
Yet, “asking India for developmental assistance is not the same as viewing India as a partner or friend,” Haqqani explains. “And while the Taliban may have differences with the Pakistani state, they are dependent on Pakistan and Pakistan remains their partner of choice as of now.”