Russia is satisfied with the level of security of its embassy in Afghanistan provided by representatives of the Taliban (banned in Russia), Russian Ambassador to Afghanistan Dmitry Zhirnov said in an interview with Russia-24 television channel on Monday.
"We are satisfied with the degree of security assistance we are receiving from Taliban units," he said.
Zhirnov said he met with a Taliban representative on August 16, who gave him "all the necessary assurances." "All of our questions, without exception, were answered in a single, so military-like [clear] answer - 'Yes.'" Then there was a civilized change of guards from former MIA fighters, who scattered, to Taliban guards. Since then there have been no negative moments," he said.
According to the diplomat, after the fall of Ghani's regime, the streets of Kabul were flooded with armed looters who robbed the population. "On the evening of August 15, armed Taliban units entered the city, everything stopped, there was a very unusual ringing silence for us. Before the Taliban, we were used to 3-5 explosions in the city every day, and we couldn't do without shooting," he said.
Zhirnov said that the Russian side had information beforehand that the Afghan military would not support the regime of President Ashraf Ghani and that representatives of the radical Taliban movement would enter Kabul peacefully.
The diplomat pointed out that the embassies of those countries that had made wrong forecasts about how the situation in Afghanistan would develop "ran away from the republic". They thought that "President Ghani would be in power for a long time" because he would be supported by his own army and the Taliban would go for a bloody takeover of Kabul.
"We had the opposite information about it ahead of time, reliable information," he said. - "We knew he wouldn't have the army's support, if only because he wasn't paying soldiers. The Afghan soldiers themselves told us that. <...> And most importantly, we had information from various sources, including the Taliban camp, that the Taliban's entrance into Kabul would be peaceful, that there would be no bloodshed, and that there were no threats to the Russian diplomatic mission or any other embassy".
"The Taliban launched a large-scale operation to take control of Afghanistan after the announcement by the US in the spring of this year of its decision to withdraw its armed forces from the country. On August 15, the radicals entered Kabul without a fight, and President Ashraf Ghani left the republic. On September 6, the Taliban declared that they had established control over the entire territory of Afghanistan, and on September 7, they announced the composition of the provisional government, which was not recognized by any country.
GSV "Russia - Islamic World"
Photo: Creative Commons
Based on materials from TASS