The Taliban’s interim foreign minister has received approval to travel to the United Nations to meet with his counterparts in Pakistan.
According to reports, a committee of the United Nations Security Council has agreed to allow Taliban interim foreign minister Maulvi Amir Khan Muttaqi to travel from Afghanistan to Pakistan to meet with his Pakistani and Chinese counterparts.
Reuters reported on Monday that Pakistan’s mission to the United Nations requested immunity for Muttaqi to travel “to meet with the foreign ministers of Pakistan and China” between May 6 and 9.
Muttaqi has long been subject to a travel ban, asset freeze, and arms embargo under UN Security Council sanctions. A UN Security Council committee agreed to allow Muttaqi to travel to Uzbekistan last month to discuss urgent peace, security, and stability issues at a meeting of foreign ministers of Afghanistan’s neighbors.
Afghanistan’s Tolo News outlet said earlier on Monday that the media in Pakistan was reporting on the upcoming visit and that Muttaqi would meet Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari. According to Tolo News, Afghanistan’s foreign ministry has yet to comment on the reported trip.
News of the Taliban official’s visit comes as representatives of nearly two dozen countries and international organizations met with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres in Qatar on Monday to discuss Afghanistan, particularly the Taliban administration. focused on the plight of women and girls under
UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said Taliban officials were not invited to attend the two-day closed-door meeting in Doha.
Dujarric said the meeting was aimed at “getting a common understanding within the international community on how to negotiate with the Taliban”. He said that the main topics of discussion include the rights of women and girls, inclusive governance, counter-terrorism, and drug trafficking.
Since seizing power in August 2021, Taliban officials have imposed laws that the United Nations has labeled “gender-based apartheid.”
