The Taliban does not pose a real threat to the government of Afghanistan and is far from being a resurgent force, junior British foreign minister Mark Malloch-Brown said in a letter published on Thursday. In the letter to The Independent newspaper, the former UN deputy secretary-general dismissed the findings of a European think-tank report last week which said that the country risks becoming a divided state. “The Taliban do not pose a credible threat to the democratic Afghan government,” Malloch-Brown wrote.Control: “The Taliban do not control a single province or have the ability to hold territory, showing they are far from being a resurgent force.” He continued: “Much progress has been made since 2001, but we recognise that many challenges remain.”
The Senlis Council wrote in a report last week that Afghanistan is in “crisis” and risks becoming a divided state, as Taliban insurgents now control vast areas of unchallenged territory, and called for the NATO-led force there to be doubled in size to 80,000. The Taliban’s regime was toppled in late 2001 by a US-led offensive, but they have stepped up their attacks recently.