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Moscow, Aug 19 (AFP): Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Thursday that armed resistance to the Taliban is forming in Afghanistan’s Panjshir Valley, led by deposed vice-president Amrullah Saleh and Ahmad Massoud, the son of anti-Taliban fighter.<\/p>\n
“The Taliban doesn’t control the whole territory of Afghanistan,” Lavrov told reporters at a press conference in Moscow following a meeting with his Libyan counterpart.<\/p>\n
“There are reports of the situation in the Panjshir Valley where the resistance of Afghanistan’s vice president Mr Saleh and Ahmad Massoud is concentrated,” he said.<\/p>\n
Lavrov also reiterated his call for an inclusive dialogue involving all political players in Afghanistan for the formation of a “representative government”.<\/p>\n
The Panjshir Valley northeast of Kabul is Afghanistan’s last remaining holdout, known for its natural defences.<\/p>\n
According to images shared on social media, Saleh and Massoud, the son of Northern Alliance leader Ahmed Shah Massoud, are pulling together a guerrilla movement to take on the Taliban.<\/p>\n
Moscow has been cautiously optimistic about the new leadership in Kabul and is seeking contact with the terrorists in an effort to avoid instability spilling over to neighbouring ex-Soviet states.<\/p>\n
While the United States and other countries rushed to evacuate their citizens from Kabul, Russia said its embassy will continue to function.<\/p>\n
Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told reporters on Thursday that the Taliban are “actively restoring order” and have demonstrated their “intent to dialogue”.<\/p>\n
She said at her weekly press briefing that the terrorist group — known for its severe treatment of women — is “ready to take into account the interest of citizens, including… women’s rights”.<\/p>\n
Earlier this week, Russia’s ambassador to Afghanistan Dmitry Zhirnov met with the Taliban in Kabul, hailing on state television a “positive and constructive” meeting.<\/p>\n
The Kremlin has in recent years reached out to the Taliban — which is banned as an “extremist” group in Russia — and hosted its representatives in Moscow several times, most recently last month.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Moscow, Aug 19 (AFP): Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Thursday that armed resistance to the Taliban is forming in Afghanistan’s Panjshir Valley, led by deposed vice-president Amrullah Saleh and Ahmad Massoud, the son of anti-Taliban fighter. “The Taliban doesn’t control the whole territory of Afghanistan,” Lavrov told reporters at a press conference in Moscow […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-169594","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169594","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=169594"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169594\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=169594"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=169594"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=169594"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}