Since taking power last summer, Afghanistan’s Taliban-led government has been isolated internationally; not a single country has yet recognized it. But in recent weeks, Taliban officials have made a series of increasingly public overtures to a once unlikely prospective partner: India. And the interest has been reciprocated, to some extent. At a regional security summit in Tajikistan in late May, Indian National Security Adviser Ajit Doval urged Afghanistan’s neighbors to provide counterterrorism aid to the war-torn country. On June 2, a delegation of senior Indian officials traveled to Kabul to meet with Taliban leaders. And on June 23, India reopened its diplomatic mission in Afghanistan.
