Roving Periscope: Now, the Taliban ban Pakistani currency in Afghanistan
Virendra Pandit
New Delhi: As the latest indicator of rising tensions with its neighbor, the ruling Taliban government in Afghanistan has banned the use of the Pakistani rupee in the country.
History might turn a full circle.
When India comprehensively defeated Pakistan and midwifed the birth of Bangladesh in 1971, it forced Islamabad to nurture, finance, and control Afghanistan to provide a “strategic depth” against any further Indian “misadventure”. Pakistan also raised the Taliban, and several terror gangs, and promoted the so-called “Khalistan” movement to get even with India.
That era closed in August 2021 when the Taliban returned to power in Kabul.
Islamabad is now sandwiched between Kabul and New Delhi!
Early this year, Pakistan tried to stop Indian aid in food and medicine from reaching Afghanistan, and even put its own banners on the trucks carrying relief material to Kabul.
The Taliban-ruled Kabul no longer “recognizes” the Durand Line, the 2,670-km-long international land border between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Repeated clashes on this border between the two neighbors and the Taliban’s violent acts to stop Pakistan from laying a barbed wire fence are routine.
Besides, the Taliban actively supports the re-emerging Tahreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) terror group, banned in Pakistan, and the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA), to keep Islamabad on tenterhooks.
On July 31, the United States conducted a precision counterterrorism strike in Afghanistan that killed Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden’s deputy and successor as leader of Al-Qaeda. Islamabad accused the Taliban of masterminding it, a claim Kabul promptly rejected.
Zawahiri’s killing was the turning point that showed Pakistan inching closer, once again, to America and resetting its bilateral relations with Washington, which is now reviving its relations with Islamabad, its old “non-NATO partner” in South Asia. As part of this strategy, the US is currently hosting Pakistan army chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa for a 10-day-long visit, aimed at seeking financial and military aid as Islamabad’s “all-weather friend” China is no longer ready to take Islamabad off the hook.
In the latest episode, the Taliban banned the use of the Pakistani rupee in their country. In a noteworthy escalation of ties between Afghanistan and Pakistan, the Taliban’s ban on the Pakistani currency came into effect on Saturday, October 1, Afghan news agency Khaama Press reported.
It said the Taliban Intelligence Agency declared the use of Pakistani Rupees in larger financial transactions in Afghanistan has been “completely banned.”
The Taliban agency’s anti-money laundering branch to the money exchange association conveyed this order. All financial transactions, including but not limited to transfers, trade, and currency exchange, are disallowed.
The report said they banned money exchange dealers from conducting transactions totaling over 500,000 Pakistani rupees. If more than the specified amount is discovered, the dealers could face legal action.
This move aimed to ban the use of Pakistani currency by some locals and traders in Afghanistan for everyday spending and food purchases.
Since the Taliban seized power in August last year, the relationship between the two sides has soured. Recently, the Taliban had accused Pakistan of permitting its airspace for use by US drones to strike targets in the landlocked country.
The Taliban accused Pakistan of receiving a whopping sum of money for allowing the US airstrikes in Afghanistan, for which, Kabul said, it had “substantial evidence” to back its claims.
Pakistan has also blamed the Taliban regime for the resumption of attacks by the TTP, which has aggravated the security situation in the country. They recorded the highest number of terror incidents in Pakistan in a single month this year in September.
