MOSCOW, January 31. /TASS/. The probability that the Taliban radical militant group that seized power in Afghanistan may face large-scale resistance in spring is not ruled out, Special Russian Presidential Representative for Afghanistan, Director of the Foreign Ministry’s Second Asian Department Zamir Kabulov told TASS on Monday.
"Such a probability does exist, unfortunately," the Russian diplomat said, replying to a question about the likelihood that disarrayed inter-ethnic protests in Afghanistan might turn into large-scale resistance to the Taliban (outlawed in Russia) after the winter was over.
"It is important for the Taliban movement and the international community right now to take utmost efforts primarily to stabilize the social and economic situation inside the country," the envoy said.
The West unfreezing Afghan national financial assets and foreign partners’ ramped-up social and economic assistance and humanitarian aid to Afghanistan will also facilitate this process, Kabulov said.
"It is also necessary to rule out inflammatory actions both inside and outside for inciting inter-ethnic strife, which is fraught with active armed actions," the Russian envoy stressed.
Situation in Afghanistan
Protests erupted in the northern Faryab province in Afghanistan on January 13, following the arrest of prominent Taliban radical commander Makhdoom Alam, an ethnic Uzbek, in Mazar-i-Sharif in the Balkh province. Representatives of the Uzbek community in the Afghan city of Meimene took to the streets, demanding that the Taliban immediately release the commander. As the local newspaper Hasht-e Subh reported, one civilian was killed and another was wounded as the Taliban moved to suppress the protests.
The Taliban radical militant group launched a large-scale offensive to seize control of Afghanistan after the United States declared its intention in the spring of last year to withdraw its troops from the country.
On August 15, 2021, the Taliban swept into Kabul without encountering any resistance while Afghan President Ashraf Ghani stepped down and fled the country. The Taliban declared on September 6, 2021, that they had taken control of all of Afghan territory, and on September 7, 2021, they unveiled an interim government in Afghanistan that has not been recognized by any country so far.