BRUSSELS: Belgium said on Monday it has granted visas to five Taliban officials who are expected to travel to Brussels in coming days for talks with the EU on returning failed asylum-seekers to Afghanistan.

The European Commission has invited the officials for discussions under a push to crack down on irregular migration and boost deportations — despite it not formally recognising the Taliban administration.

“The five requested visas were granted on Monday afternoon after a security assessment,” said a spokeswoman for the foreign minister of Belgium, which issued the documents in its capacity as host country to the European institutions.

The visas are valid only for Belgium and not the broader free-movement Schengen area and for one day only, she said. Belgium said it would not disclose the date of the delegation’s arrival for security and public order reasons. But diplomatic sources and Afghan and EU media reports suggested the talks could take place on Tuesday.

The planned meeting has proved controversial, with critics saying it would renege on the bloc’s values.

“EU countries are undermining their credibility by condemning Taliban abuses and pursuing accountability on one hand, while cooperating with the Taliban to forcibly return Afghans on the other,” said Fereshta Abbasi of Human Rights Watch.

European governments shut their embassies in Kabul when the Taliban authorities returned to power in 2021 and imposed their strict interpretation of law.

Women must be almost entirely covered when they leave home and are banned from a host of public places, including parks and gyms, while girls’ education stops at age 12.

Brussels and EU countries have denied that hosting Taliban officials would be tantamount to recognising the government in Kabul.

And this month the European Union’s migration chief Magnus Brunner defended the outreach saying Brussels had no other option than to talk to the Taliban government about returning irregular migrants from Afghanistan.

European governments have sought a tougher stance on migration as public opinion has hardened, fuelling far-right electoral gains across the continent.

EU countries received about a million asylum applications filed by Afghans between 2013 and 2024, according to the bloc’s data agency. About half as many were approved over the period.

Around 20 of the EU’s 27 member states expressed interest in returning some migrants without a right to stay, particularly those with criminal convictions, to Afghanistan in a letter last year.

“The focus for member states is very much on persons who have committed serious crimes or who pose a security threat,” commission spokesman Markus Lammert told journalists.

Rights groups have questioned the legality and ethics of returning migrants to a country that is in the midst of a severe humanitarian crisis, with millions facing hunger and economic hardship, according to the United Nations.

Published in Dawn, June 23rd, 2026