The Taliban's takeover of the capital, Kabul, on Sunday, sparked astonishment around the world, with immediate repercussions for the three regional powers neighboring Afghanistan, namely Pakistan, India and China.

In a report published by the American newspaper "Washingtonpost", the writers Jerry Cheh, Rebecca Tan and Neha Masseh, say that the governments of the three countries have in recent months accelerated the pace of their diplomatic contacts with the Taliban in anticipation of the possibility of it becoming a major political force in Afghanistan, but What happened exceeded expectations, as it took complete control of the country and changed the geopolitical landscape in the region.

Pakistani victory

For Pakistan, the American newspaper says, the Taliban's return to control of Kabul represents a strategic victory over India, but it is also likely to constitute a nightmare by giving it a boost to the "Pakistan Taliban" movement, which entered into a clash with the Pakistani government, and is different from the Afghan Taliban movement.

As for India, what happened increases its concerns about the situation in Kashmir, in light of border tensions with Pakistan on the one hand, and China on the other.

As for China, the US withdrawal has raised fears of the expansion of extremist groups that threaten the ambitious infrastructure projects that Beijing is building westward across Eurasia, according to the American newspaper.

The scale of the threats was clearly visible last July when a suicide bombing targeted a bus carrying Chinese construction workers in northwest Pakistan, killing 13 people.

Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi said the attack was carried out by the "Pakistani Taliban" with the help of India and the Afghan government, a claim India rejected as "ridiculous".

And last April, the Pakistani Taliban tried to assassinate the Chinese ambassador in Islamabad with a car bomb outside his hotel in Quetta, according to the American newspaper.

Andrew Small, a scholar at the German Marshall Fund and author of The China-Pakistan Axis: The New Geopolitics of Asia, says there are varying levels of concern in Islamabad, New Delhi and Beijing over the ease and speed of the Taliban's seizure of power.

According to Smoth, Pakistan, which facilitated the Taliban's return to power, "probably did not welcome the way things were done. There will now be tougher Chinese positions and pressure to ensure stability in the neighborhood."


On Monday, Pakistan's foreign ministry called on Afghan leaders to "work together" and said it had "consistently emphasized that a political solution is indispensable".

China, for its part, said it "respects the will and choice of the Afghan people," while Indian officials declined to comment.

Shift in the Chinese position

According to the American newspaper, China's non-hardline stance on the Taliban represents a radical shift compared to previous decades, when Beijing was expressing fears that the Taliban would harbor Uyghur fighters.

Last month, Beijing released pictures of Foreign Minister Wang Yi shaking hands with Taliban leader Abdul Ghani Baradar, giving the movement a kind of legitimacy from the Asian superpower.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian defended the Taliban as a different political movement from the Islamic extremists operating in Pakistan.

On Monday, Chinese state media spoke of the "collapse of the two-decade American project in Afghanistan," and reassured the Chinese people that the threats linked to Xinjiang Province are not what they used to be.

"The United States is an unreliable country that can abandon its allies in critical times, and the situation in Afghanistan sums it up," wrote Hu Zhijin, the senior editor of the Chinese government newspaper, the Global Times.

The official Xinhua News Agency commented on yesterday's events, considering it a "turning point that shows the decline of American hegemony," while other media outlets were more cautious in dealing with developments, according to the Washington Post.

Phoenix TV, in a commentary on the Taliban's control of the capital, Kabul, confirmed that China was ready to contain any repercussions on the Afghan arena by pressuring the Taliban to publicly distance itself from the "forces associated with Xinjiang", and to conduct joint military exercises with Russia and other countries in the region. To strengthen border controls.

Dan Markey, a senior researcher at Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies, sees China's number one concern as security, meaning the influx of refugees and fighters.

The people, the ideology, the trained fighters - that's what takes priority."

Indian fears

In New Delhi, which has long demanded a power-sharing deal in Afghanistan, fears have risen in recent months after the retreat of the forces of its ally, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani.

Some Indian officials have stated that a Taliban takeover of Afghanistan would make Islamic militant groups more powerful and violent from Kashmir to Xinjiang.

Devra Hooda, a retired officer who commanded Indian forces in Kashmir until 2016, said he does not expect a repeat of the 1990s scenario when foreign fighters poured into Kashmir from Afghanistan and helped fuel the insurgency, as India significantly reinforced its border integrity in the past years.

But the Indian officer believes that the return of the Taliban will boost the morale of the armed groups based in Pakistan, such as Lashkar-e-Taiba, Jaish-e-Mohammed and the Pakistani Taliban, and explains in this context, "It is a moral victory that some terrorist groups may exploit to try to recruit more young people in areas such as Kashmir." , he told the American newspaper.

A new wave of Afghan refugees

3 million Afghan refugees have resided in Pakistan - for more than 40 years, half of whom are recognized by international organizations and provide them with assistance, and the other half are considered illegal residents, according to a previous report by Al Jazeera Net.

In contrast, India, which does not share a land border with Afghanistan, does not host a large number of Afghan refugees.

The number of Afghan refugees in Iran - according to a census conducted in 2016 - is 1,583,979, most of whom are spread in the cities of Tehran, Mashhad, Qom and Kerman, amid expectations that the number is higher given that half of the refugees in Iran are not registered, and Iran announced Yesterday Sunday it will set up camps to provide temporary shelter for Afghan refugees in 3 border provinces

The arrival of new Afghan refugees to Iran, in addition to the presence of about 3 million of them, has imposed great pressure on the country, while Iran suffers from US sanctions and difficult economic conditions, as well as the outbreak of the Corona virus, drought and environmental problems.

West Asia and Indian subcontinent expert Bermohammed Malazhi believes that because there is a long border between Iran and Afghanistan, it is very difficult to prevent the entry of new Afghan refugees, and the country's ability to accept more Afghan refugees is limited.

The flow of Afghan refugees to Turkey continues with the escalation of clashes in the country between the Afghan government and Taliban militants. The Turkish Defense Ministry also decided to reinforce its forces on the border with Iran in order to prevent illegal crossing.