Former Indian diplomats on Monday termed the Taliban's takeover of Afghanistan as a "setback" for India strategically, and asserted that the priority for New Delhi right now should be to evacuate its citizens from the war-torn nation.
Two Indian aircraft would be permitted to operate from the Kabul airport which is under the control of American security forces, government sources told ANI.
If New Delhi finds itself out in the cold in Afghanistan, both the Congress-led UPA and BJP-led NDA have only themselves to blame. Each has been in power for a full decade from 2001, without reaching out to the Taliban, points out Ajai Shukla.
Death came calling for the 71- year-old terrorist from the sky on Sunday morning in Kabul.
Simultaneously more than 60 countries led by the United States and the European Union issued a joint statement urging those in positions of power and authority across Afghanistan to bear responsibility and accountability for the protection of human life and property, and for the immediate restoration of security and civil order.
According to one American analyst, the "house that was struck was owned by a top aide to Sirajuddin Haqqani," who is now the interior minister in the Taliban government in Kabul.
A couple of days before American troops leave Kabul on Tuesday, August 31, images to remember from the Afghan capital and elsewhere...
"The deal is being implemented. We witnessed attempts on the part of the US to undermine this cooperation and make India obey the American orders to follow the American vision of how this region should be developed," Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said.
Donald Trump's Republican Party has wrested control of the 435-member United States House of Representatives from the ruling Democratic Party with a razor-thin majority, setting the stage for a showdown with Joe Biden in the next two years of his presidency.
Pak's role in Kabul is not sending a good message to India, a top American lawmaker has said
Biden's lengthy remarks on Afghanistan contained no condemnatory references to the Taliban, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar, who played a stellar role in beginning India's systemic dealings in Afghanistan in 1994.
The unalloyed truth about the Ukraine-Russia conflict is that it is a war that Russia cannot lose and Ukraine cannot win, observes Colonel Anil Athale (retd).
The United States officials in Afghanistan naively handed the Taliban a 'kill list' to target Afghans who aided American forces in the country, according to a media report.
'India will want a lot of help from the US, but it's not going to want US troops.'
At least seven people, including three Afghan nationals who clung to a US Air Force plane to escape Taliban rule, died on Monday in a melee at the Kabul airport, as hundreds of people scrambled to board flights in a desperate bid to get out of Afghanistan, following the toppling of the government led by President Ashraf Ghani.
A US Congress-constituted quasi-judicial body on Monday recommended to the Biden Administration to designate India, China, Pakistan, Afghanistan and 11 other nations as "country of particular concern" in the context of status of religious freedom.
The US actions can be seen as a riposte to India's neutral position on the Ukraine crisis, its continuing import of Russian arms and oil thus undermining Western sanctions, argues Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
The Taliban has its backers, notably Pakistan and China. Their purpose is to have a monstrous entity near India's northern borders to keep democratic, secular India off-guard, observes Amulya Ganguli.
The Western powers appear to regard Delhi as the most logical destination in the region in these extraordinary times -- as a counterpoint to the ascendance of political Islam and a rising red star over Afghanistan, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Former United States President Donald Trump has promised that he will take America's relationship with India to the next level again if he wins the presidential election in 2024.
'US citizens who are at the Abbey Gate, East Gate, or North Gate now should leave immediately,' the statement said, without further detail, reported The New York Times.
The Biden administration expects the Modi government to continue to remain as its loyal camp follower even as Washington continues to act in self-interests, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Reports coming from the ground confirm that an intense battle between Taliban and opposition forces to control the Panjshir Valley north of Kabul, the last Afghan province holding out against the group.
Regional States will be worried that the US's nascent engagement with the Taliban behind the fig leaf of humanitarian aid enables the return of US intelligence personnel to Afghanistan, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Expressing concern over the situation in Afghanistan, a group of eminent persons, including former ministers K Natwar Singh, Yashwant Sinha and Mani Shankar Aiyar, on Wednesday urged the government to continue engaging with the Taliban and not allow any political party to use the developments in that country to communally polarise Indian society for electoral gains.
Khan said that India, which is a part of Quad, has imported oil from Russia despite American sanctions.
The award-winning journalist was killed in July last while covering clashes between Afghan troops and the Taliban in Spin Boldak district of Kandahar city.
Following al-Zawahiri's death, supporters of al-Qaeda, or its affiliated terrorist organisations, may seek to attack US facilities, personnel, or citizens
The maiden bilateral meeting between President Joe Biden and Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday will further strengthen the US-India strategic ties and allow the leaders to discuss the situation in Afghanistan and how the two countries can work together to fight terrorism, a senior White House official has said.
This is Blinken's first visit to India after assuming charge as the US Secretary of State and the third by a high-ranking Biden administration official after it came to power in January.
'China is a friendly country and we welcome it for reconstruction and developing Afghanistan'
Addressing the UNSC High Level Open Debate on 'Peacebuilding and sustaining peace: Diversity, state building and the search for peace', Muraleedharan said the expectations of the international community on Afghanistan, including on combating terrorism, are set out clearly in the UN Security Council Resolution 2593, that was adopted under India's Presidency of the 15-nation Council in August.
A closure of the Indian mission in Kabul will be a Himalayan blunder at this historic juncture when the wheels of diplomacy and politics are set to accelerate in Afghanistan, argues Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar
The day that Russia invaded Ukraine was the day Pakistan's Prime Minister Imran Khan met Vladimir Putin at the Kremlin.
Afghanistan will remain a frontline state for Washington for a foreseeable future in terms of the potential threats to US national security from terrorist groups, asserts Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar, who played a stellar role in beginning India's dealings in Afghanistan in 1994.
Pakistan's nuclear arsenal is 'simply a deterrent' to protect the country and there will no longer be any need for it once the Kashmir issue is resolved, Prime Minister Imran Khan has said as he asserted that if the Americans have the resolve and the will, the issue can be sorted out.
The US has said it will go ahead with its plan to conclude its Afghanistan mission by August 31, even as the evacuation effort, which is now in its "retrograde period", is facing an "ongoing and acute threat" from ISIS-K.
'It will remain hostile to Indian interests owing to its close proximity to China.'
India is worried about Pakistan getting the Taliban to ignite trouble in Kashmir, observes Ramesh Menon.
Heading G20 will give India a foreign affairs year like it has never had in history. You can trust Narendra Modi to exploit this to India's benefit. And, of course, to his own in his election year, explains Shekhar Gupta.
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