News Snapshot:
The geopolitical location of Afghanistan has been the focal point of Great Power rivalries. Beijing has been waiting on the sidelines for long, and perhaps now hopes to fill the power vacuum left behind by the United States (US). China has come a long way since the 1990s, when it extended support to the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance. Of late, China’s strategy towards the Taliban was to start warming up to it even before the US formally withdrew from Afghanistan. Beijing did not get embroiled in counter-insurgency operations on the Taliban. Rather, it adopted a hedging strategy. Chinese leaders have consistently...
