The Taliban* seized power in Afghanistan on 15 August after the group's troops entered the capital Kabul and the country's President Ashraf Ghani fled the nation. The insurgent group's final offensive took place amid the withdrawal of US and NATO troops from the country.
The situation in Afghanistan “collapsed” after the hasty withdrawal of US and NATO troops from the country, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has stated in a speech at the Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University in Kaliningrad, Russia. In the minister's opinion, this outcome clearly shows the importance of cooperation between western nations and Russia in terms of resolving global conflicts and crises.
Lavrov stressed that Russia does not plan to communicate with purely terrorist groups in Afghanistan, but noted that the Taliban has a political wing.
While officials from several western countries described the decision to withdraw troops from Afghanistan as a mistake, US President Joe Biden defended the move in his 16 August address. POTUS argued that even 20 more years of deployment wouldn't have changed the situation in Afghanistan, adding that American soldiers should not be fighting in a foreign war that the Afghan people themselves don't want to fight for, apparently referring to the failure of Kabul's former army to defend cities instead abandoning them for the Taliban to capture.
The US president was criticised domestically for his…
