Russia’s Geopolitical Pivot: From Taliban Terrorists to Strategic Partners

It wasn’t so long ago that the word “Taliban” in Russian news broadcasts was synonymous with terror, extremism, and dark mutterings about security threats spreading like mold toward the borders of the former Soviet Union. For over two decades, Moscow’s official line was as frozen as Siberian winter: the Taliban, the fundamentalist group that now runs Afghanistan, were stamped on Russia’s notorious list of banned terrorist organizations. But in an abrupt and, dare we say, geopolitically fashionable pivot, the Russian Supreme Court has snuffed out this two-decade designation. Welcome to the new normal in Moscow’s approach to the regime in Kabul, where old enemies become guests of honor at economic forums and anti-terrorism strategies, and diplomatic rules are rewritten to suit a swiftly shifting world order.

From Blacklist to Backslap: Courts, Calculations, and the Kremlin’s Thaw​

On Thursday, in what will surely rank as one of the strangest post-Cold War legal reversals, Russia’s highest court suspended the designation of the Taliban as a terrorist group—a status it had imposed in 2003, in the shadow of the Second Chechen War and under the pretense that the Taliban were fueling separatist flames in Russia’s own turbulent Caucasus region.
What prompted this judicial handbrake turn? The Kremlin isn’t keeping anyone in suspense. It’s the blunt instrument of strategic necessity. Ever since the Taliban swept back into power in the summer of 2021—ousting the Afghan government as the last U.S. planes clawed out of Kabul—Russia has been among the few to carve a practical, if not official, niche for itself in Taliban-run Afghanistan. In the choreography of international relations, events move fast, and Moscow is determined not to let ideology get in the way of a perfectly transactional partnership.

The Pragmatism Behind the Pivot​

Observers might initially scoff—how could Russia, so recently waging its own so-called “war on terror” in Chechnya and Dagestan, suddenly see any benefit in cozying up to a regime infamous for its medieval social policies and roughshod human rights record?
The answer, as it so often is, boils down to two words: isolation and opportunity.
Ever since its 2022 invasion of Ukraine sent diplomatic relations with the West spiraling into freefall, Russia’s quest for new friends and alternative markets has become an existential priority. With each new sanction and every Western company closing up shop, Moscow has sought fresh partners—anywhere, anyhow. And Afghanistan, with its natural resources and strategic location, has looked increasingly appealing.

Afghanistan: Rubble, Riches, and Realpolitik​

While the world wrings its hands over the Taliban’s grim record on women’s rights (no windows if you might see a woman, please), Moscow’s calculus is starkly different. There are minerals to be mined in Afghan hills, pipelines to be discussed, trade corridors to be mapped, and perhaps most importantly, a militant threat that both Russia and the Taliban have every reason to fear: ISIS-K.
It hardly escaped anyone’s attention in Moscow that the terrorist group ISIS-K, which claims allegiance to the so-called Islamic State (and which makes the Taliban look moderate by comparison), was responsible for a massacre at Moscow’s Crocus City Hall in March 2024, killing 145 concertgoers. If there’s one thing that forges friendships in geopolitics, it’s a shared enemy.
In this, the Kremlin sees the Taliban not as would-be invaders of Soviet Central Asia but as a firebreak against the spread of something even more destabilizing.

From Pariahs to Summit Guests: Taliban on the World Stage​

Russia’s outreach to the Taliban hasn’t only been backroom whispering or quiet canvassing by diplomats. In 2022 and again in 2024, Taliban delegations strode onto the red carpets of the St. Petersburg Economic Forum, one of the heartbeats of Russian soft power, where government leaders and hand-picked oligarchs ink deals and plot the next phase of the Russia-friendly world order. There, amid the suits and the security details, the Taliban were no longer radioactive—they were guests.
Nor were these appearances isolated overtures. When President Vladimir Putin declared last July that Russia and the Taliban were now “together in the fight against terrorism,” it marked an unambiguous shift in emphasis. No longer arch-villains, the Taliban had been recast as reluctant allies in the regional anti-terror show—at least for now.

International Recognition: Still a Bridge Too Far​

Before anyone starts printing Taliban-branded business cards for the next global G20, it’s worth noting one major detail: no country, Russia included, officially recognizes the Taliban regime as the rightful government of Afghanistan. It’s one thing to trade and talk; it’s another to formalize diplomatic legitimacy.
Yet Russia has not only kept its sprawling Kabul embassy open, it was one of the first countries to quickly reactivate diplomatic operations after the U.S. withdrawal—a canny move to secure a front-row seat as the new Afghan chapter unfolds. That’s a clear sign of intent. The embassy, now one of the few operating at full strength in Kabul, has served as both a listening post and an entry point for whatever commercial ventures might be possible. In the game of long-term influence, showing up counts for a lot.

The Long Memory of Moscow: Taliban, Chechnya, and Russian Security Concerns​

The Supreme Court’s original terrorist designation of the Taliban in 2003 was no accident. At that time, Russia was in the thick of its campaign against Chechen militants and worried about radical Islamist ideology spreading across its southern borders. Back then, the Taliban’s support for various Sunni jihadist movements in the Caucasus made it an obvious scapegoat.
Those fears haven’t evaporated, but they have been outpaced by new ones. Today, ISIS-K is a much more immediate threat—not only to Afghanistan, but potentially to Russia and Central Asia. The Taliban, eager to shed its old image and court international (read: economic) acceptance, has spent significant effort positioning itself as the iron wall against ISIS-K’s ambitions.
Moscow, ever pragmatic, has decided that it’s less risky to have the Taliban as uneasy border guards than as estranged, embittered outcasts.

Sanctions, Sanity, and Survival: The Russian Approach​

If the last few years have demonstrated anything, it’s that autocratic leaders tend to value survival above all—and are remarkably inventive in their alliances. After almost limitless rounds of Western sanctions, Russia is running a diplomatic marathon with brick walls every hundred meters. Necessity breeds strange friendships, and in the post-Ukraine world, “enemy of my enemy is my trading partner” is a maxim with new urgency.
Inviting the Taliban to the St. Petersburg Forum was more than a taboo-breaker—it was a signal to the world that Russia is determined to chart its own course, alliances be damned. That move will unsettle Europe and Washington, but few in the Kremlin seem to care. They see echoes of Cold War opportunism—each partnership is a brick in the wall of a new multipolar order.

Economic Opportunities: Afghanistan’s Hidden Lures​

Lest anyone think Russia is motivated by strategy alone, let’s talk business. Afghanistan is not just mountains and misery—it’s home to untapped veins of rare earth minerals, copper, lithium, and precious stones. For a Russian economy increasingly starved of Western technology and investment, these are not just rocks in the ground—they’re lifelines.
Add to this the prospects for fuel exports and joint infrastructure projects, and the incentives become clear. Moscow’s economic overtures to Afghanistan—trading grain, building logistics routes, investing in energy hubs—are designed to lay down real roots, not just test the waters.
Of course, there’s much that’s wishful thinking. Afghanistan’s security environment makes large-scale investment hazardous, and the Taliban’s erratic governance gives even the most hardened Russian oligarch pause. But the ambition is unmistakable, and with so few friends left, Russia is willing to take calculated risks.

The Great Central Asian Balancing Act​

Moscow’s Taliban strategy carries echoes of imperial past and practical present. Central Asia, with its patchwork of weak states, Russian military bases, and Chinese economic footprints, sits at the crossroads of all these contradictions.
On the one hand, Russia must reassure its ex-Soviet neighbors—where suspicion of Islamism runs deep—that rapprochement with the Taliban won’t mean exporting extremism northwards. On the other hand, it’s betting heavily on the Taliban being more interested in governing (however brutally) than exporting chaos.
There are no guarantees here—only more balancing acts along Russia’s already precarious periphery.

The United States, the Taliban, and a Shifting Narrative​

Let’s pause to savor the irony. After two decades of U.S.-led counterinsurgency, the Taliban is now in dialogue with two of America’s main geopolitical rivals: Russia and China. While Washington freezes Taliban assets and debates how (or if) to deal with Afghanistan’s humanitarian crisis, Moscow steps in, asking few questions and offering the kind of deals that only truly isolated states can deliver.
It’s not a partnership based on shared values—just shared needs, born of exclusion from the Western system and real, immediate threats.

Human Rights: Still Out in the Cold​

For all the talk of security and strategy, there’s no escaping the grim reality faced by millions of Afghans, particularly women and girls, under Taliban rule. If anything, the Taliban’s internal policies have become more draconian since their return: strict bans on female education and employment, oppressive dress codes, and, yes, even prohibitions on building windows from which women might be glimpsed.
Moscow, ever the unsentimental realist, studiously avoids raising these issues, seeing human rights as a “Western problem.” This silence comes at a price—Russia’s reputation among liberal democracies was already radioactive, and embracing the Taliban does nothing to improve it. But, in the Kremlin calculus, those are bridges already burned.

What About Recognition?​

Given these overtures, how long before Russia formally recognizes Taliban rule in Afghanistan? That’s the million-ruble question. For now, Moscow seems content to do business without offering full legitimacy. Recognition would bring legal risks (hello, international law complications) and would antagonize still-useful partners in India and Iran, each with their own Afghan anxieties.
So, for now, this is the “friends with benefits” stage of geopolitics: embassies open, trade flowing, but no move to send the regime’s flag up the official mast at the United Nations.

The Taliban’s Game: Courting the East​

The Taliban, for its part, is playing the long game. Sanctions have battered the fragile Afghan economy, and only alternative alliances—Russia, China, Pakistan, and Iran—offer hope of breaking the isolation. Acceptance at premier Russian forums is a public relations coup, and Moscow’s recognition of their (relative) reliability against ISIS-K allows Taliban officials to cast themselves as responsible, if strict, governors.
They crave the legitimacy that comes with international acceptance, and Russia offers them at least a halfway house on their road to respectability.

New Realities, Old Habits: What’s Next?​

If there’s anything the past few years have taught us, it’s that the global order is more flexible—and more transactional—than at any time since World War II. Russia’s move to delist the Taliban is one piece in a jigsaw full of sharp edges: pragmatic, cynical, and unmistakably self-interested.
It’s a bet that Afghanistan under the Taliban can be contained (or, better yet, monetized) and that mutual suspicion of the West will prove a basis for cooperation. It might work—or it might backfire spectacularly if Afghanistan’s ever-shifting militant landscape spills over into Central Asia, dragging Russian interests into a maelstrom.
For now, though, the approach is clear: keep competitors close, keep enemies even closer, and never let a little thing like two decades of “counter-terror” stand in the way of a fresh start.

The Broader Implications: Is This the New Geopolitical Playbook?​

Will other countries follow Moscow’s lead? China has made many of the same moves—reopening its embassy, holding quiet talks, discussing investments. But Beijing, ever cautious, is unlikely to drop its own terror designations so soon, preferring to deal rather than to embrace.
In Europe and the U.S., the reaction is predictably scathing. Washington, in particular, has spent two decades building the case against the Taliban, and it won’t be forgiven in a hurry. But the new realities may pressure others to soften their stances in time—especially as economic interests, regional stability, and the specter of global jihadist groups like ISIS-K come to the fore.

Conclusion: Friends for Now, Partners Only If Convenient​

Are the Taliban now Russia’s new best friends? Not quite—this isn’t a love story. But it is a tale of necessity, of shifting allegiances, and of the messy, transactional realities that define the current international order. Moscow’s decision is a signal to the world that, when push comes to sanction-shaped shove, old rules can be thrown out in favor of expediency.
No one knows how long this axis of convenience will last. The Taliban’s search for legitimacy is likely to run aground on the same rocks as always: international skepticism, internal repression, and chronic instability. Russia’s outreach, for its part, could either secure a new foothold in Central Asia or land it squarely in the middle of Afghanistan’s next upheaval.
One thing is clear: in the marble halls of the Russian Supreme Court and the dusty backstreets of Kabul alike, pragmatism now rules the day—and yesterday’s terrorist is today’s tactical partner. Welcome to the new rough-and-tumble of Eurasian geopolitics, where yesterday’s enemies are tomorrow’s diplomats, and the only real certainty is that the rulebook is still being written—one surprising reversal at a time.

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Source: Ruetir Russia no longer considers the Taliban as a terrorist group – the post