A Taliban member watches as Afghans cross the border to Pakistan last week. His recent calls to engage with and “incentivise” the Taliban since it took power resonate in Pakistan, where the US war on terror has bred resentment and hostility. The Taliban takeover and the shambolic US withdrawal from Afghanistan have made Khan’s positions look prescient, if not correct. But rhetoric in support of the Taliban has broad sympathy in Pakistan - a September Gallup poll found that 55 per cent of Pakistanis were “happy” with the Islamists taking power in Afghanistan.
For his pro-Taliban stance, he was ridiculed by critics who said his positions were hollow and half-baked. In 2013, as chair of his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party, Khan threatened to block Nato supply routes after US drone strikes in Pakistan. He had repeatedly decried the US war on terror, and its involvement in Afghanistan since 2001, saying in countless interviews that it was one of Pakistan’s “biggest blunders” to get involved, a mistake that cost over 70,000 Pakistani lives compared with less than 2,500 American soldiers. Long before US President Donald Trump signed a withdrawal deal with the Taliban, Khan had been pushing for peace talks.
The charismatic former cricket star and playboy had for years criticised the US invasion of Afghanistan, using anti-American messaging that found an audience beyond hardline Islamists in his own country. Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan appears vindicated by the Taliban takeover in Afghanistan.
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