MOSCOW: Russia’s Supreme Court on Thursday removed the Taliban’s designation as a “terrorist organisation”, a symbolic gesture aimed at building friendly ties with Afghanistan’s de facto rulers.
The Islamist group seized power in Afghanistan in August 2021, when American forces supporting the country’s internationally recognised government pulled out.
Moscow, which called the US withdrawal a “failure”, has taken steps to normalise relations with the Taliban authorities since then, seeing them as a potential economic partner and ally in fighting terrorism.
“The previously established ban on the activities of the Taliban — included on the unified federal list of organisations recognised as terrorist — has been suspended,” Supreme Court Judge Oleg Nefedov said in a ruling, according to the TASS state news agency.
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