Taliban sells off Afghanistan's natural resources to enrich themselves
On 24 December 2024, the New York Times published an article of its U.S.-Pakistani author Azam Ahmed, in which he blamed Afghan anti-Taliban militias for the fall of Afghanistan. In his article Azam Ahmed implicated that they were more corrupt than the Taliban. What he failed to mention was the human rights abuses, the terrorism and the corruption of the Taliban and its allies inside Afghanistan and outside of Afghanistan, in particular the Pakistani government and ISI.
In this post this matter should discussed. Of course this is only about what happened after Taliban's gaining control over Afghanistan.
According to most recent news the USA has stopped any financial aid to the Taliban. This doesn't mean the end of the Taliban regime, though. Afghanistan is rich in natural resources, which is a well-known fact even known by the Taliban.
While the industrial countries needs not only energy but also raw materials and rare earths to produce modern technology, like smartphones, computers, computer chips and hardware for data storage. The most recent development is the artificial intelligence (ai), which needs all of these resources multiple times.
Several articles have been published on that issue:
1) France 24 (2 February 2025): Cash-keen Taliban betting on Afghanistan's mines
The article mentions: "Emeralds, rubies, marble, gold and lithium: the resources buried across Afghanistan's rocky landscape are estimated to be worth a trillion dollars, according to US and UN assessments from 2010 and 2013. (...) The World Bank says the results are already visible: a 6.9 percent expansion of mining and quarrying drove an industrial sector increase of 2.6 percent in 2023-2024. But while the government "has auctioned several small mining contracts to meet its cash requirements, many of these contracts have yet to commence operations", it said in a December report."
Taliban leaders, who are illiterates and have no clue about business, sell off Afghanistan's natural resources to China, according to the article: "The Chinese state-owned company MCC is already operating at the Mes Aynak copper deposit, the world's second-largest, located 40 kilometres (25 miles) from Kabul, under a 2008 contract revived by the Taliban government."
2) The Washington Post (2 February 2025): A Taliban highway could lead to the future. But it's stuck in the past.
The article is mainly about Afghanistan's possible connection to China's industry to sell Afghanistan's resources (at a loss): "The regime wants to build a highway through the Wakhan Corridor, the narrow, rugged panhandle in the far northeast, to connect the Afghan heartland with China — and place itself at the center of international commerce."
3) Shafaqna Afghanistan (30 January 2025): Taliban-style discrimination; "Building roads, hospitals, and dams in Kandahar, Uruzgan, and Maidan Wardak in exchange for mining in Bamyan"
The article mentions: "The Taliban’s Ministry of Mines and Petroleum has awarded the extraction of several mining areas in the Shiite and Hazara-dominated Bamyan province to private companies in exchange for the construction of roads, hospitals and dams in the Pashtun-dominated provinces of Kandahar, Uruzgan and Maidan Wardak. (...) The Taliban’s Ministry of Mines and Petroleum has said that these contracts have been signed for five years and will be extended for a second time if the companies work in accordance with the principles, procedures of the mines and their commitments. These contracts were signed by Hedayatullah Badri, the Taliban’s acting Minister of Mines and Petroleum, with officials from private companies. The handover of lead and zinc mines in the Shiite, Hazara-dominated province of Bamyan in exchange for the construction of roads, dams, electricity, and hospitals in Pashtun-dominated provinces has met with widespread backlash. Afghan citizens have called the Taliban’s move “discriminatory,” “cruel,” and against the country’s mining law. They argue that Bamyan province is one of the most deprived and underdeveloped provinces in the country, and according to the law and principles, the province’s mines should be used to build roads, hospitals, water and electricity dams, schools and universities in this province, and not in other provinces."
4) The Panjshir Valley, a former stronghold of anti-Soviet and anti-Taliban resistance fighters, is famous for its emerald, a very famous and expensive gemstone, which the Taliban also sell far below its market value.
5) Balkhab has huge copper and coal mines. The Taliban lead a bloody war against the Shia population of Balkhab and finally subjugated the local population in August 2022 in order to extract the natural resources of that region for their own benefit. While millions of Afghans are freezing during the cold winters of Afghanistan, Uzbekistan as a main supporter of the Taliban, purchases Afghanistan's coal:
"A delegation of Uzbek business representatives has expressed interest in purchasing Afghan coal in an effort to maintain trade balance between the two countries, according to the Taliban’s Ministry of Industry and Commerce."
So while USA under the Trump-administration is watching and hesitating to attack the Taliban or to bring back its weapons worth several billion U.S. dollars, as Donald Trump promised prior to his presidency in 2025, regional countries are creating facts. It seems that the USA will finally lose its dominance in the world, as it has failed to create a clear policy towards Afghanistan and the world.
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