Women in burqa in Kunduz City, Afghanistan / credit: Wanman uthmaniyyah on Unsplash

United States Outruns Regional States in Race for Kabul

The U.S. Treasury Department quietly signaled on February 2 that it was “tweaking” sanctions against Afghanistan’s Haqqani Network, a Sunni Islamist militant organization. International banks can now transfer money to the Taliban, including its affiliated Haqqani Network, without fear of breaching sanctions, which means the United States may now have a say in the Taliban-run government, writes M.K. Bhadrakumar.