India and the Afghanistan Taliban are a part of a multilateral delegation attending Russia’s peace summit for Afghanistan in Moscow on Friday, November 9.
Indian officials have, however, termed that the Indian participation in the Moscow Format will be “non-official” in nature.
Raveesh Kumar, external affairs ministry spokesperson said, “Our participation at the meeting will be at the non-official level.” He added, “India supports all efforts at peace and reconciliation in Afghanistan that will preserve unity and plurality, and bring security, stability and prosperity to the country.”
This will be the first time that India and the Taliban will be face-to-face for such important, geopolitical talks following the hijacking of the Indian Airlines’ flight IC-814 in 1999 that was rerouted to Kandahar in Afghanistan, which was then ruled by the Taliban.
Like India, Afghanistan will also be sending a non-official delegation to attend the meeting. This will include the deputy heads of its High Peace Council, Habiba Sarabi and Haji Deen Mohammed.
Apart from India, China, Pakistan and the United States were also sent invites to attend the summit. Russian news agency Sputnik also reported that other Central Asian countries — Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan — have also been invited to the summit. Iran has also received an invite for the summit.