There are multiple reports of secret meetings between Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence and several prominent exiled Afghan leaders in Turkey. Amid Pakistan’s growing military and diplomatic tensions with the Taliban-led Afghan government, the ISI’s attempt to step up interactions with anti-Taliban leaders is aimed at turning around Pakistan’s fortunes in Afghanistan. However, this effort is misguided, costly, unnecessary, and dangerous.
Zalmay Khalilzad, the former US Special Representative for Afghan Reconciliation, has rightly argued that the Pakistani security establishment would use anti-Taliban Afghan political figures as “bargaining chips with the Taliban to get concessions.” Khalilzad’s plea—that “former Afghan leaders should know better than to become pawns in ISI’s games”—is a clear warning to Afghan leaders, who should be cautious not to become instruments in the ISI’s manoeuvres in Afghanistan.
While the National Resistance for the Salvation of Afghanistan—a coalition of political and military leaders from the former Afghan government—has denied that its members met with ISI officers, Pakistan’s growing frustrations with the Afghan Taliban have lent credence to reports of a recent meeting in Turkey with exiled Afghan leaders such as Abdul Rashid Dostum, Salahuddin Rabbani, Abdul Rab Rasul Sayyaf, Mohammad Mohaqiq, and Karim Khalili.
It is believed that the discussions covered both the potential reopening of political offices for these groups in Islamabad and the coordination of efforts to counter the nexus between the Afghan Taliban and the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). While Khalid Pashtoon, spokesperson for the anti-Taliban coalition, brushed aside reports of a meeting with the ISI, he expressed willingness to engage in such dialogues with Pakistan, saying that “it is essentially a form of engagement, and such meetings should not be considered wrong or sinful.”
Worsening bilateral ties
It should be noted that since the Taliban seized power in Afghanistan in 2021, many Afghan heavyweights have found refuge in Turkey, which has been a relatively neutral party in the Afghan conflict.
The ISI has a long history of maintaining clandestine and not-so-clandestine ties with various Afghan political groups, including the Afghan Taliban, doling out money and weapons to instigate violence against any regime in Kabul deemed hostile to Islamabad.
By trying to engage with exiled Afghan leaders in Turkey, the ISI likely hopes to exercise influence over domestic political developments in Afghanistan. It is therefore both dramatic and ironic that the ISI, which has the dubious honour of being the godfather of the Afghan Taliban, is in the process of undermining the regime led by its former proxy in Kabul. The reasons are not far to seek.
The TTP has been posing significant security challenges to Pakistan, and it shares many ideological affinities with the Afghan Taliban. Pakistan’s military-led counter-terrorism operations had definitely dealt a severe blow to the human, organisational, and infrastructural potential of the TTP. But the threat has re-emerged with greater vigour following the Taliban’s return to power in Afghanistan, which has encouraged the TTP to embrace much of the same playbook.
At the same time, the retreat of American forces from Afghanistan flooded Pakistan’s market with modern firearms, giving militants an edge over security forces. Moreover, Pakistan’s terrorism problem is as much a home-grown one, with the complicity of many state institutions and religious organisations over the last three decades.
On 21 December last year, the TTP mounted an attack on a security post in South Waziristan, killing at least 16 Pakistani soldiers. Pakistan responded with airstrikes against TTP targets in Afghanistan, killing 46 people, as claimed by the Afghan government. This tit-for-tat killing frenzy has significantly worsened the bilateral relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan. Pakistan’s military establishment has become extremely critical of the Afghan Taliban for its unwillingness to control the TTP menace. Pakistan Army Chief General Asim Munir on Tuesday again asked the Afghan Taliban to take concrete action against militant groups using Afghanistan’s territory, as their cross-border attacks “have a direct impact on Pakistan’s peace and stability.”
What seems to have added urgency to Islamabad’s efforts to mobilise the anti-Taliban political forces is India’s growing proximity to Afghanistan’s new rulers. Pakistan’s military establishment has long resented India because New Delhi limits its geopolitical ambitions and counters its reckless policies.
In January, India’s Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri met with Taliban’s acting foreign minister Amir Khan Muttaqi in Dubai, marking the highest level of political dialogue between India and Afghanistan since the Taliban takeover in 2021. The Taliban has also been keen to strengthen political and economic ties with India, calling it a “significant regional and economic power”. In November 2024, the Afghan Taliban was finally able to nominate Ikramuddin Kamil as their envoy to New Delhi, even though India has not formally recognised the Taliban regime in Afghanistan.
Following Pakistan’s air strikes inside Afghanistan claiming to target TTP camps, India condemned the bombings, asserting that it was “an old practice of Pakistan to blame its neighbours for its internal failures.”
India’s public statement in favour of the Afghan Taliban is an unmistakable sign of the growing bonhomie between New Delhi and Kabul. Conditioned by decades of zero-sum thinking toward India, Pakistan is sure to interpret New Delhi’s latest efforts to elevate diplomatic ties with the Taliban regime as directed against Islamabad’s interests. Since a strong Indian presence in Afghanistan has always remained a strategic nightmare for Pakistan, engaging with exiled Afghan leaders in Turkey could be a way for Pakistan’s security establishment to thwart India’s attempts to gain a diplomatic foothold in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.
Also read: India’s Taliban outreach does little for Afghanistan. Focus on visa reforms, Loya Jirga
Gamble backfires
The ISI may not have it as easy as it once did with its manoeuvres and machinations of coercion, deception, bribery, and patronage, because the Taliban regime seems determined to assert its autonomy from Pakistan. The Taliban’s control over Afghanistan remains almost unchallenged, with no political or military force capable of ousting its rule for the foreseeable future. Moreover, many lower-ranking members of the Afghan Taliban want their leadership to support their Pakistani counterparts—the TTP—against the Pakistani state.
It is abundantly clear that Pakistan has realised its Taliban gamble has backfired, becoming a trap that leads to serious strategic setbacks. Islamabad’s decision to push the ISI to increase its interactions with exiled Afghan leaders in Turkey is aimed at cultivating crucial intelligence and diplomatic sources while offsetting further strategic damage. It also suggests that Islamabad has made up its mind to take an adversarial stance toward the Afghan Taliban, which has refused to heed Pakistan’s persistent demands to contain the TTP threat.
Although Taliban-led Afghanistan has a long way to go before it can handle any military threat from nuclear-armed Pakistan, there is no denying that Pakistan is facing a growing set of serious challenges emanating from Afghan soil that will significantly complicate its regional diplomacy.
The author is assistant professor, Sardar Patel University of Police, Security and Criminal Justice, Rajasthan. Views are personal.
(Edited by Aamaan Alam Khan)