Taliban\u2019s interim foreign minister gets UN clearance to travel for meeting with counterparts in Pakistan.\u00a0Pakistan\u2019s UN mission requested an exemption for Muttaqi to travel between May 6 and 9 \u201cfor a meeting with the foreign ministers of Pakistan and China”.
\nA United Nations Security Council committee has agreed to allow the Taliban\u2019s interim foreign minister, Mawlawi Amir Khan Muttaqi, to travel to Pakistan from Afghanistan to meet with Pakistani and Chinese counterparts, according to news reports.
\nInternational\u00a0news agency reported on Monday that Pakistan\u2019s UN mission requested an exemption for Muttaqi to travel between May 6 and 9 \u201cfor a meeting with the foreign ministers of Pakistan and China\u201d.
\nMuttaqi has long been subjected to a travel ban, asset freeze and arms embargo under UN Security Council sanctions. The UN Security Council committee agreed to allow Muttaqi to travel to Uzbekistan last month for a meeting of the foreign ministers of neighbouring countries of Afghanistan to discuss urgent peace, security, and stability matters.
\nAfghanistan\u2019s news outlet said earlier on Monday that media in Pakistan were reporting on the upcoming visit and that Muttaqi would meet with Pakistan\u2019s Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari. Afghanistan\u2019s foreign ministry had not yet commented on the reported trip, according to international news.
\nNews of the Taliban official\u2019s trip comes as representatives of nearly two dozen countries and international institutions met on Monday in Qatar with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres for talks on Afghanistan, focusing particularly on the plight of women and girls under the Taliban administration.
\nTaliban authorities were not invited to attend the closed-door two-day meeting in Doha, UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said.The meeting aims \u201cto achieve a common understanding within the international community on how to engage with the Taliban\u201d, said Dujarric, who noted that recognition of Taliban rule \u201cis not up for discussion\u201d. Key discussion topics include women\u2019s and girls\u2019 rights, inclusive governance, countering terrorism and drug trafficking, he said.
\nSince seizing power in August 2021, Taliban authorities have imposed rules that the UN has labelled \u201cgender-based apartheid\u201d.\u201cAny meeting about Afghanistan without the participation of the Afghan government is ineffective and counterproductive,\u201d Abdul Qahar Balkhi, the Taliban foreign ministry spokesperson, told international media.
\nWomen have been barred from almost all secondary education and universities, and prevented from working in most government jobs. Last month, Taliban authorities extended the ban to working with UN agencies.
\nThe Taliban administration says the ban is an \u201cinternal issue\u201d that should not influence foreign dealings.
\nBut, in response, the UN has ordered a review of its critical relief operation in Afghanistan, where many in the 38-million-strong population rely on food aid. The review is due to be completed on Friday. The UN has said it faces an \u201cappalling choice\u201d over whether to maintain its relief efforts in Afghanistan.
\nGuterres said on social media before leaving for Doha that \u201creversing all measures that restrict women\u2019s rights to work is key to reaching the millions of people in Afghanistan that require humanitarian assistance\u201d.
\nThough not invited to the talks, the head of the Taliban representative office in Doha, Sohail Shaheen, said he had met with delegation members from the United Kingdom and China. He said the UN meeting and \u201cthe importance of engagement\u201d were among topics raised.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Taliban\u2019s interim foreign minister gets UN clearance to travel for meeting with counterparts in Pakistan.\u00a0Pakistan\u2019s UN mission requested an exemption for Muttaqi to travel between…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6450,"comment_status":"registered_only","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6449","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6449","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6449"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6449\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6450"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}