Whatever spin the Taliban puts on its ‘new’ Afghanistan, it’s difficult to find any cause for optimism

Editorial: When the west calls on the Taliban to respect human rights and warns it against sponsoring terrorism, will it pay any heed? Probably not

(AP)

The flag of the Taliban is flying over Her Britannic Majesty’s embassy in Kabul (now “just a building”, according to the defence secretary, Ben Wallace). The mujahideen are patrolling around in Humvees and armoured vehicles left behind by US and Afghan forces. The executions and persecutions have begun. The leaders of the insurgency are lounging around in the presidential palace. To borrow a phrase, the Taliban have seized power almost without a shot being fired. It is difficult to summon up much optimism about the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, as we must now learn to call it.

What is in the minds of the Taliban’s leaders? It is too easy to dismiss them as crazed, misogynistic religious extremists, though they certainly are that. They have been shrewd enough to survive a two-decade campaign by everything the west had to throw at them, and at the end, they are back. They are certainly driven by a medieval ideology and will push their luck as far as they can. The question is, when the west calls on the Taliban to respect human rights, especially those of girls and women, and wants it to stop sponsoring terrorism as it did before, will the Taliban pay any heed? Probably not.

The experience of the last period of Taliban rule and the more recent experience of its resurgence suggests that it does not respect the Islamic quality of mercy. Its spin doctors have made some appeasing noises, but even those suggest that no Afghan female can expect to be educated beyond the age of 12, or follow a professional career or even dress as they wish. Much worse might turn out to be the reality.