On Wednesday’s broadcast of Bloomberg’s “Balance of Power,” Rep. Jake Auchincloss (D-MA) said that the Taliban has “been reasonably effective in counterterrorism” and “reasonably responsive to Western needs to have signals and human intelligence about counterterrorism threats.” But they have been atrocious on human rights and we’ll have to work with them on “mining and access to rare earth elements and copper and iron, in a constructive way” while “also holding them to account to allow all people there complete freedom of opportunity.”
Auchincloss stated, [relevant remarks begin around 16:00] “It’s been a tale of two Talibans in the last two years. I think, on the one hand, the Taliban have been reasonably effective in counterterrorism operations. They actually share a lot of U.S. and Western interests in keeping ISIS-K at bay and have been reasonably responsive to Western needs to have signals and human intelligence about counterterrorism threats. And we saw that could be effective with the over-the-horizon strike on a terrorist leader last year by the administration. On the other hand, the Taliban have been horrendous on the rights of women and girls, and, in general, in trying to advance the socioeconomic development that the United States was able to shepherd through over the last 20 years, particularly with literacy for girls. And so, the United States is going to have to use a carrot-and-stick approach, where we are working on economic development issues, particularly mining and access to rare earth elements and copper and iron, in a constructive way, with Afghanistan, but also holding them to account to allow all people there complete freedom of opportunity.”
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