The United States and Qatar signed an accord on Friday for Qatar to represent U.S. diplomatic interests in Afghanistan, an important signal of possible future direct engagement between Washington and the Taliban after two decades of war.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and his Qatari counterpart, Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani, signed the agreement making Qatar the U.S. “protecting power” in Afghanistan at a State Department ceremony after holding talks.
The move will further strengthen relations between Washington and the small, wealthy Gulf monarchy, which forged close ties with the Taliban by hosting the militants’ only official office outside Afghanistan and by playing a key role in the talks that led to the 2020 deal for the U.S. troop pullout this year.
The agreement comes as the United States and other Western countries grapple with how to engage with the hardline Islamists after they took over Afghanistan in a lightning advance in August as U.S.-led forces were completing their pullout.
The United States and other Western countries shut their embassies and withdrew their diplomats as the Taliban seized Kabul, following which the militants declared an interim government whose top members are under U.S. and U.N. sanctions.
