Taliban emissaries in Europe: the image would still have been impossible last year. But since the fall of Kabul last summer, the new Afghan regime in search of respectability has multiplied more or less official meetings on European soil. His envoys are this time in Geneva, Switzerland.
With our correspondent in Geneva, Jeremiah Lance
After Osloil, two weeks ago, representatives of the Islamist regime are therefore in Geneva, at the invitation of an NGO specializing in respect for humanitarian standards. Even if politics is never far away.
Discussions are taking place behind closed doors, all week, with the Geneva Call organization, which is already present in Afghanistan.
Officially, it is a question of advancing on the respect of humanitarian standards and the delivery of aid to civilians. Alain Délétroz, the director of Geneva Call, hopes for concrete results on the ground.
” We have been working with many armed movements in the world for years and we always try to enter with the idea that we can convince them to make efforts and make progress, he explains. For us, the people who have arrived in Geneva are people who have been delegated by the power in place in Kabul and whom we hope have the means to ensure that humanitarian standards are respected in Afghanistan. »
No legitimization of the regime
international aid has been totally blocked since the Islamists took power. Western countries want to make its recovery conditional on respect for human rights by the taliban. By going to Geneva to address this subject, the new masters of Kabul therefore hope to deceive and continue their respectability operation.
Exchanges with officials from the Swiss Ministry of Defense are also on the agenda. But there is no question, Bern warned, of considering the meeting as a legitimization of the Taliban regime.
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