In the current global economic landscape risks often tend to outweigh the opportunities. This makes it obligatory for national and international policymakers to work together to contain the risks and unleash the potential opportunities to build a new world.

Interestingly, the international community (including Pakistan) has shown rare unity in grappling with issues emerging from the Taliban’s orthodoxy and, helped by ground realities, succeeded in extracting commitments that have made the Taliban project themselves as moderates. US President Biden says they are facing an ‘existential crisis.’

The various foreign economic sanctions imposed following Taliban take-over should gradually be lifted to encourage them to honour their promises. Resisting pressure, Washington should also stick to its commitment to withdraw its troops by August 31. Taliban say there would be no announcement of the Afghan Cabinet until the last US soldier has left Afghanistan.

Helpful towards the reconciliation of different Afghan political players will also be the decision of the Jeddah-based Organisation of Islamic Cooperation to send Muslim envoys to Kabul to stress the importance of ‘peace, stability and national reconciliation.’

It is in the interest of the international community, particularly those nations sharing common borders, to help Afghans achieve peace, prosperity and political stability

Going beyond reconciliation, peace and stability will largely depend on the rapid reconstruction of an economy ravaged by 42-years of war. Elsewhere in the world, including Vietnam, the end of armed conflicts has been followed by national reconstruction. The modernisation of the Afghan economy will create its own corresponding political superstructure, different from a medieval poverty-ridden Afghanistan under foreign occupation.

The failure of the US mission in Afghanistan may be multifaceted as many critics have pointed out, but the most outstanding factor is, however, the American neglect of nation-building to widen prosperity and create durable political stability.

It is worsening poverty that helped sustain the Taliban’s insurgency. The poor and vulnerable were one of the major sources of recruitment for the Taliban militia.

This is also borne out amply by a statement of President Biden made earlier this month coupled with his two earlier important observations as an American Senator in 2001 and 2003.

On August 16, Biden said, “our mission was never supposed to have been nation-building.” The US military intervention had always been about preventing a terrorist attack on the American homeland.

In 2001 at the outset of the armed conflict, Biden defined the long-term objective by saying “we will see a relatively stable government in Afghanistan — one that provides the foundation for future reconstruction of that country.” Again, in 2003, in another quote, he said “alternative to national building is chaos, a chaos that churns out bloodthirsty warlords, drug traffickers and terrorists.”

For national political and economic reconstruction, the Taliban need to set up an inclusive government and seek the support of the international community. The Taliban are conscious that their future would be shaped by the success or failure of the rebuilding of the country. They claim “the coming era is of development and prosperity.” They have asked the US to stop taking doctors and engineer out of Kabul as Afghanistan needs their expertise. They have also appealed to the Afghan people not to leave their country.

The process of national-building in Afghanistan would also unleash the potential for the resurgence of Central Asia. This is likely to open an opportunity for Pakistan to advance its geo-economics policy in the region.

Former Pakistan’s Ambassador to World Trade Organisation Dr Manzoor Ahmad says several stalled projects in Afghanistan could be resumed quickly as substantial work has already been done while throwing fresh light on their viability and benefits to participating countries. They include the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India Gas Pipeline and the Central Asia-South Asia (CASA-1000) power project. He also suggests a widening of transit trade and making Afghanistan a part of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor project. He sees Pakistan building up a new economic partnership with Afghanistan.

Fitch Solutions, the research arm of the Fitch Group, expects Afghanistan’s GDP to shrink by as much as 20pc this year following the Taliban’s take-over and drying up a major source of grants and aid. Here, however, no less important is as to who benefited from a reported $1 trillion poured into Afghanistan by the US over 20 years. The poor did not. Nor did the Americans win the hearts and minds of a majority of the Afghan citizens. The US Congress Library Service noted this year that 90pc of the Afghan population lived on $2 a day. According to an Asian Development Bank report, poverty has been rising since 2017.

Afghanistan needs a peoples-centred development strategy to build an economic and political order based on equity and social justice. As Nobel Prize winner Amartya Sen said quite some time ago “the focus on development should be for advancing the richness of human life rather the richness of the economy in which human beings live.” And the aim should be to enlarge peoples’ capability — such as to be fully healthy, empowered and creative — so that they can choose things in life that they value.

Realising those capabilities, he elaborates, depends on the people having access to basics of life — adapted to the context of each society — ranging from nutrition & food, healthcare, education to personal security and political voice.

Prompted by the complex situation in Afghanistan the Chairman of the High Council of National Reconciliation Abdullah Abdullah has told the Taliban negotiators that he supports an independent and unified Afghanistan based on justice and fairness. And former President Karzai says it is time to unite all Afghans for the betterment of the war-torn country and for education, development and prosperity.

It is in the interest of the international community particularly those nations sharing common borders to help Afghans to achieve peace, citizens’ prosperity and political stability and prevent the spillovers of possible chaos which can’t be ruled out if national reconstruction is overlooked.

Published in Dawn, The Business and Finance Weekly, August 30th, 2021