Afghanistan’s National Resistance Front (NRF) commander, Ahmad Massoud, has pleaded with the international community to stay in the country.
While attending a conference of anti-Taliban figures, human rights activists, and academicians in Vienna, Ahmad Massoud cautioned against cooperating with the Taliban in an interview with The National. “You are dangerously mistaken if you think you can co-opt the Taliban with money and diplomatic relations,” he cautioned.
He said that Afghanistan not only served as a shelter for terrorist organizations and an epic jail for its citizens, but also had the potential for “catastrophic” historical events to be repeated.
According to Massoud, the NRF is a broad coalition of Afghans that stands in for a more agreeable alternative administration. He said that the organisation supports democracy, human rights, and the rule of law.
“We want freedom, liberty, democracy, and justice,” he added.
Even though the NRF “do not have any support from anywhere,” Kabul already receives $40 million in aid each week, much of it indirectly from the West, particularly the US, he claimed.
According to him, the West must exert pressure on the Taliban to uphold human rights and permit the Afghan people to decide their own future.
We must not abandon Afghanistan,” Massoud emphasized. “The world community must choose whether the nation will follow the path of democracy and freedom or a ruthless and repressive government will govern it.