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China pressures Afghanistan’s Taliban to stop attacks on its interests in Pakistan, dangles economic carrot
- Chinese diplomats were forced into action by Pakistan’s failure to prevent a surge in such terrorist attacks launched from Afghanistan
- Beijing has proposed investments in Afghanistan if Kabul could restrain the militants responsible for the attacks, analysts say
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China has started to lean on Afghanistan’s Taliban regime to prevent cross-border attacks on Chinese personnel and interests in neighbouring Pakistan, according to two well-placed sources in Islamabad.
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Chinese diplomats in Islamabad and Kabul were forced into action by Pakistan’s failure to prevent a surge in such cross-border terrorist attacks from Afghanistan, as well as from Iran, they said.
The Chinese diplomats are “searching for alternative ways” of persuading Afghanistan’s Taliban regime to rein in the thousands of Pakistani Taliban militants it granted safe havens to after seizing power in 2021, according to a source in Islamabad who sought anonymity because of political sensitivities.
Chinese diplomats based in Islamabad have told influential Pakistanis that they felt “back-stabbed” by the Afghan Taliban government for refusing to restrain the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) faction that Islamabad holds responsible for a vehicular suicide bombing attack in March, which claimed the lives of five Chinese nationals working in northern Pakistan, along with their Pakistani bus driver.
Beijing effectively recognised the Taliban regime by accepting the diplomatic credentials of its envoy in February.
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Police officials told This Week In Asia last month that their investigations found that the so-called ‘broken switch’ faction of the TTP had launched the terrorist attack from its camps in Khost province in eastern Afghanistan.
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