Whole world, including Russia and China, must prevent terrorists from using Afghanistan for attacks abroad – NATO chief

“I strongly agree that the entire worldwide group, together with Russia and China, must work to forestall Afghanistan being a spot the place terrorist teams can function freely and put together, set up, plan, finance assaults towards our personal international locations,” Stoltenberg advised the Telegraph.

The NATO chief echoed the phrases of UK Overseas Secretary Dominic Raab, who stated final month that international locations like Russia and China must be introduced in to assist test the scenario in Afghanistan after energy there was seized by the Taliban.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Chinese language counterpart Xi Jinping mentioned Afghanistan over the cellphone per week after the Taliban captured Kabul. The leaders agreed to work collectively on stopping instability spilling over from Afghanistan, together with preventing terrorism and drug trafficking.

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After the Taliban takeover, the nation has seen the resurgence of Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISIS-Okay), an Islamic State (IS, previously ISIS) affiliate in Afghanistan, and Al-Qaeda.

Talking to the Telegraph, Stoltenberg acknowledged that the Taliban victory was associated to the truth that NATO member states selected to tug their troops out of Afghanistan.

The NATO-trained Afghan military largely dissipated within the face of the Taliban offensive, leaving militants to seize a large stockpile of navy {hardware}, together with costly US-made weapons and kit.

“I feel the dearth of logistics help for the Afghan safety forces was one of many foremost explanation why we noticed this sudden collapse,” the NATO chief stated. He added that authorities troops lacked pay and ammunition, and “there have been no clear plans to defend the nation.”

The US-led alliance has to attract classes from its almost 20-year-long mission in Afghanistan, which needs to be “clear-eyed and sincere concerning the failures and what did not work,” Stoltenberg stated.

Militants captured Afghanistan’s capital Kabul on August 15, forcing President Ashraf Ghani to flee overseas and prompting many Western international locations to frantically evacuate their nationals and native helpers. The fast Taliban offensive ran concurrent with the ultimate stage of the withdrawal of US troops, which was accomplished on August 30. 

The dramatic developments in Afghanistan reignited talks about establishing the EU’s personal fast response pressure, impartial from NATO. Stoltenberg welcomed extra efforts to strengthen Europe’s protection, however argued that such a pressure “can by no means exchange NATO and we have to guarantee that Europe and North America band collectively.” Any try and weaken that bond will weaken NATO and divide Europe, he stated.

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