The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Afghanistan’s Taliban-led government has praised the removal of the Taliban from Kyrgyzstan’s list of banned groups, TOLOnews reported.
The Afghan news agency cited Abdul Qahar Balkhi, spokesperson for the Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs, as saying that Kyrgyzstan’s decision reflects the establishment of political understanding in relations with the Islamic Emirate (the Taliban-led government) at both regional and global levels and signifies the elimination of obstacles to further strengthening relations between the [Afghan] caretaker government and other countries.
The government of Kyrgyzstan has not officially announced the move, but on September 2, the country’s Prosecutor General’s Office published a list of 20 organizations recognized as terrorist or extremist in Kyrgyzstan, but the Taliban was not among them.
On September 6, the Chairman of the Cabinet of Ministers of the Kyrgyz Republic Akylbek Japarov met with the Charge d’Affaires of Afghanistan in Kyrgyzstan, Nurullah Amin.
The Kyrgyz government’s press service reported that the parties exchanged views on various areas of further bilateral cooperation between the Kyrgyz Republic and Afghanistan.
Japarov stated that Kyrgyzstan is interested in developing trade and economic relations with Afghanistan, transport links, joint development of Afghan mineral deposits, and cooperation in the energy, industry and agriculture sectors.
In June, Kazakhstan’s President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev announced that his country had removed the Taliban from its list of terrorist organizations, stressing that the move was made to develop trade and economic ties with Taliban-led Afghanistan.
